Bad Company
by mispel
Summary: An encounter at the cemetery doesn't go as planned for Buffy and Willow. Xander witnesses the aftermath. Season 2. Vamped Scoobs.
1. Bad Turns

Bad Company Till The Day I Die

Ch. 1: Bad Turns

  
  


Buffy walked through the cemetery like so many times before. But totally different. Even opposite. Still the same in one way - the being alone thing that Buffy hadn't liked when she was alive, she still didn't like it. It was boring, and it made her think. And boring and thinking were two very bad things.

Then Buffy wasn't alone. Someone was at her grave.

Buffy watched her throwing herbs on a fire. She could smell them. There was a lot of black smoke rising up, getting lost in the dark before it reached the sky. It was more like Willow was burning leaves and not summoning dark forces.

Willow was chanting. Then she cleared away the smoke, and Buffy was standing there. Smiling.

Things didn't go as planned. But it wasn't Buffy's fault. Willow did things. She almost blinded Buffy, throwing something in her face. Then Willow cut her and said some words. Buffy could feel something happening. The cut Willow made was tingling. She had to stop her.

The gash down her arm was healing, but the stuff Willow had thrown into her eyes was still stinging. Willow tasted different than the other people Buffy had eaten. It made her feel funny, a little dizzy, so Buffy sat down next to the dead fire and dead Willow.

Buffy sat like that for a while trying to shake off the weird feeling. She knew when he was there because he made this guttural choking sound when he saw Willow dead on Buffy's grave.

Xander looked at Buffy like she was insane, when it was really he who was insane because he attacked her. Not that it made any difference - she was going to do him anyway. It was just so stupid of him to come at her like that, like he could do anything to her. His face was contorted in grief and anger and just plain stupidity.

Xander had the stake raised high, and it was no challenge at all. Buffy toyed with him for a while. Let him go at her a few times. For old times sake. Then she tripped him up and slammed him into the dirt.

"Xander, Xander, Xander," Buffy said when she had him pinned to the ground. "We're gonna play nice."

Xander looked anguished - giving up, looking over at Willow, reaching out his hand to her. So melodramatic.

"There, there don't be sad, kamikaze Xander. Buffy will make it all better," she promised him as she leaned into his neck.

  


To be continued...


	2. Best Friends Forever

Best Friends Forever

  
  


Willow and Xander were lying head to toe, with Xander kind of sprawled while Willow was turned a little to one side. They both looked equally dead. They died so soon one after the other, like those old couples. There was a time when Buffy would have been heartbroken to see it. Last week, wasn't it? At least Xander's blood took away the funny, magicy taste Willow's blood had left in Buffy's mouth. Maybe magic blood was an acquired taste, like asparagus.

Willow was gone, and Xander was never going to be the same. Or he was always going to be the same. Depends on how you looked at it. Buffy was considering this weighty philosophical issue as she was playing with dead Willow's hair. She was waiting for Xander to wake up. Sometimes she shook him to see if that would speed things up. It didn't.

Boredom had induced a slight doze in Buffy, and she was startled when Xander woke up with a start. His face changed in an instant. Xander jumped up and looked around for something to eat. He looked at Buffy then at Willow.

"Vampire. And empty," Buffy told him pointing at herself then at Willow's corpse.

Xander's glowing eyes stared with incomprehension of a new vampire, stupid with extreme hunger of the kind no human has ever experienced. Buffy knew the feeling.

"The munchies are killer, huh?" Buffy said with understanding and loud over-enunciation of someone speaking to the recently undead and stupid.

Xander looked at Buffy then at Willow. For a second, as Xander stared at Willow, the look on his face wasn't pure hunger. Then he turned to Buffy again.

"Did she taste good?" Xander asked through his teeth.

  


The cab was parked in an alley. They could smell the garbage rotting in the dumpster behind the pancake house. They could really smell it. Improved sense of smell - check. Not always an asset - double check.

"You screwed it up!" Xander was yelling.

"Who's the sire here? Me! Check the chain of command. I yell at you, mister," Buffy reminded him. The yelling sounded extra loud to their enhanced hearing in the enclosed space of the cab. Superhearing - also not always an asset.

"You botched it! You killed her. You..."

"Hey!" Buffy backhanded him in the mouth to forestall any name-calling.

Xander wiped his blood and the cab driver's blood off his face. The cab driver had foolishly picked them up in the middle of the night, one block from the cemetery, just because Buffy had saved his life that one time. He made for a nice little meal for her and Xander.

Now they were in the back seat of the cab with the driver dead in the front. His head was tilted back over the driver's seat where Xander had ripped off the headrest for better access. There was still a little bit of blood pooling in the gashes on the man's neck.

"She was up to something. I caught her desecrating my grave, the final resting place of Buffy Summers, Beloved Daughter and Friend, The Best Slayer That Ever Lived. And how long does it take to hammer out a nice headstone, maybe a statue?" Buffy asked since her grave only had a temporary marker, which didn't say anything about being beloved and stuff.

"It's was ordered. They said four to six weeks. Why did you have to kill her?" Xander whined.

"She didn't give me a choice. She did her magic hoodoo thing - went all witchyfoo on me," Buffy explained.

"What was she doing?" Xander asked.

"I don't know. Trying to turn me into a frog," Buffy told him.

"Willow was afraid of frogs," Xander said in a wistful voice and made a puppy dog face.

"A toad then. She's gone. No sexy vampy Willow, just dead as dirt Willow," Buffy said pouting.

She wasn't happy about it either. Buffy wanted to turn Willow. She was looking forward to some vampy, girl fun. They were going to do go shopping together, do each other's hair and makeup. It was still a big issue for Buffy. Was her lipstick on straight? Was her mascara smudged? Buffy kept looking at mirrors, storefront windows, even the rear view mirror of the cab, expecting to be able to check herself out. No mirror Buffy. No vampy Willow. So sad.

"She must have got her mitts on Miss Calendar's witch stuff," Buffy figured.

"Nerds. They're always getting into trouble. It's always nerds opening ancient tombs, and making atomic bombs, and cooking up viruses, and curing cancer, and all that stuff people aren't supposed to do," Xander groused.

"Yeah. If the world was filled with stupid people, there'd be no war, or disease, or mummy curses," Buffy agreed.

"Willow would have made a great witch, I bet. She would have made a great vampire," Xander lamented.

"She isn't really gone. She is a part of us," Buffy consoled him.

Xander gave Buffy an extreme scowl that said 'I can't believe you just said that'.

"No, really. I drank her blood. And you drank my blood. See? I had a Willow straight up. You had a Willow cocktail - Willow on ice with a splash of Buffy and a wedge of Xander," Buffy explained.

"The bartending circle of unlife? Wow. I guess when I think of it that way ... it still sucks that you killed Willow," Xander said.

"Would you stop it with that," Buffy warned him. He was bringing her down.

Xander leaned his head back on the seat. The punctures where she had bitten him were still red and raw. Buffy knew how they felt, how they throbbed. She licked them. They were bumpy and interesting. She touched her own bite mark. Not nearly as neat. Sloppy and ragged. Someone was a messy eater. If you know you're going to make someone a vampire, do you first give them an unsightly scar? You do if you are an inconsiderate bastard who's never getting any ever.

"What now?" Xander asked sullenly.

"Don't tell me you are bored already," Buffy said sitting back with a deep sigh of a slayer who had been turned into a vampire, turned one of her best friends into a vampire, and killed the other one. By accident. Mostly. Xander scratched his bite mark.

"We're vampires. We'll do vampire things," Buffy told him decisively yet vaguely.

Xander rolled his head around on the seat so he was looking at her. She turned and looked at him.

"So who do you want to eat next?" Buffy asked him.

  
  


To be continued ... 


	3. Finicky

Finicky

  
  


Xander was hungry because he only had half a cabdriver. Buffy was hungry because though she had all of Willow, almost all of Xander, Xander had siphoned off a lot of that when she was turning him. The two of them were wandering aimlessly down the dark streets of Sunnydale trying to figure out if they should eat anyone they know.

"How about the family?" Buffy asked.

"That would be like eating a half chewed hot dog out of the garbage when there are succulent pieces of fillet mignon walking around," Xander said.

"I guess the Harris family is not on the menu," Buffy concluded.

"How about Joyce? She's succulent?"

"Ewww. And that's too much like chewing on my own arm. Plus, she was majorly guilting me about ditching school. If she finds out that I'm not really dead, I'll never hear the end of it," Buffy told him.

"I think the growling of my stomach drowned out the part of your reasoning that made sense," Xander told her.

Before Buffy had the chance to explain it to him, they heard a cough from up the street. They swung around and changed direction. The hacking cough came from a woman, a little too bundled up for the weather, carrying a small shopping bag.

"What are you doing out at this time of night?" Xander said in a tone both concerned and menacing.

The woman sneezed in answer.

Buffy noticed she had a drugstore bag in one hand and a wad of tissues in the other, with a box of them under her arm. She also noticed watery eyes and a nose festively red and raw from wiping.

"You don't look very appetizing," Buffy told her.

"I have a cold," the woman said through her mucus stuffed nose.

"You don't say," Xander quipped.

Buffy looked all around. It was a quiet street lined with apartment buildings and parked cars.

"Where's the all night drug store around here?" Buffy asked trying to remember where she had seen one.

The woman pointed back where she came from.

"Around the corner," she said helpfully.

Buffy started off where the woman had pointed. Xander hesitated.

"Aren't we gonna...?" Xander asked pointing his thumb at the woman who was already going on her phlegmy way. She wasn't fillet mignon, but Xander was still hungry after splitting the cabdriver with Buffy when he could have gone for the whole cabdriver and some fries and a shake and then another cabdriver.

"She's full of germs," Buffy said.

"Does that matter? Do vampires get colds?" Xander asked feeling hungry and not particularly picky.

"I don't know. But I just got over the flu, and I am not sucking down on Ms. Phlegmy McMucus over there," Buffy declared and they were off to find the pharmacy.

  


The neon sign proclaimed that that the place was open twenty-four hours. Buffy and Xander walked in. Buffy grabbed a shopping basket. She planned to pick up some toiletries and magazines.

"Wow, the mediciny smell is extra mediciny," Xander noticed.

"Welcome to the unlife. No need to stoop and smell the roses. We can smell 'em just fine from up here," Buffy said as she picked up some cotton balls.

"These heightened senses can be kind of a pain in the ass. It's not all roses out there. How many things do you want to get a good whiff of," Xander complained.

Xander went toward the checkout counter. There was a guy behind the cash register, leafing through a tabloid. Buffy turned her head to one side as she eyeballed him critically. Xander picked up some candy bars.

"He's kind of pimply," Buffy said not bothering to keep her voice down.

"Hey!" the guy behind the counter objected.

"And you're kind of picky," Xander told her. He was ready to bite down, pimples or no pimples. The candy bars were for later.

"I don't want eternal acne to go with my eternal life," Buffy said as she walked away. She looked to see who else might be around.

"It's zits not the bubonic plague. They aren't contagious. You're not hungry because you noshed on Willow," Xander accused her as he dumped an armful of candy into her shopping basket.

"Was I supposed to let a perfectly good friend go to waste?" Buffy asked him.

"I guess not," Xander said grudgingly.

"You are just jealous because you only got second hand Willow," Buffy told him. "Anyway, she was magically undelicious."

They went to the back of the store. There were no shoppers around. But there was man in a lab coat working in the pharmacy.

"Hey, the pharmacist looks disease free, and his skin is unblemished. Unless a little myopia is a problem for you?" Xander asked seeing the pharmacist behind his counter, pushing his glasses up his nose.

"No, guys in glasses sometimes have nice asses," Buffy said.

Xander had nothing to say to that. The pharmacist was middle aged. His ass was covered by his lab coat. Most importantly, he didn't look like he had anything they could catch.

The pharmacist saw them approach, and he looked behind him. Buffy and Xander weren't paying attention, or they would have seen that he was looking at a mirror, and the two of them weren't in it. The pharmacist raised a spray bottle. This, Buffy and Xander noticed.

"Is that Windex?" Buffy asked.

The pharmacist pressed the trigger and nothing happened.

Buffy and Xander shrugged at each other.

The pharmacist fumbled with a sprayer, switching it to mist. A fine spray of holly water filled the air between him and Xander and Buffy. Xander and Buffy felt a sting of tiny holy water droplets. Their faces changed and hissed under the mist.

"Ow ow ow! What's a pharmacist doing with holy water?" Buffy asked as she dropped her basket and backed away.

"Spraying us with it!" Xander said totally unnecessarily,

"It's not a prescription drug," Buffy said as she looked for something to shield her from the holy water mist so she could go on the offensive. But it was all vitamins and herbal supplements in her isle.

"In case of vampires spray liberally. He's got no range. He's got it on mist," Xander noticed from his own isle.

The pharmacist took a moment to switch it to stream increasing the range of his weapon.

"Oww! Way to give him ideas," Buffy yelled at Xander. The stream hit her hand where she had raised it to cover her face. The phrase 'not the face, not the face' meant nothing to the pharmacist.

Xander shielded himself with an economy sized box of panty shields. Seeing what he was holding, Xander dropped them like they had cooties. Then feeling less squeamish and more holy water sprayed, he grabbed an item from the next isle - a package of Depends.

"They are absorbent, aren't they?" Xander said to justify his choice.

Xander decided that he would circle around and get at the pharmacist from one side while Buffy kept him busy on the other. He went down the isle. He didn't get far. As soon as Xander got to the front of the store, the checkout guy was waiting for him. The guy had a stake in one hand a hammer in the other.

"That's so classic. So Hammer," Xander commended him. "You don't mind a little punning, do you?"

Xander grabbed the stake from him with vampire speed. The guy hammered Xander on the knuckles, and Xander dropped the stake. The guy tried to pick it up. Xander stepped on it. The guy hammered Xander's big toe. Xander stepped off the stake.

"Ouch! Damn! You guys are really making me work for my supper. Come on!" Xander said unhappy to meet so much resistance.

The checkout guy had the stake raised and the hammer ready. Xander knocked them both out of his hands and kicked him in the kneecap. Then he bit him, and it was all worth it.

Xander was still licking his lips when he went to the back of the store to see how Buffy was doing. Buffy was doing fine. She had found the meager food isle. A dusty looking can of beans was her weapon of choice. She lobbed it at the holy water spraying pharmacist, and he was out like a light. Buffy was holding him up by his lab coat as she fed. Xander almost slipped on the holy water.

"Clean up on isle five!" he announced to no one.

  
  


To be continued...


	4. Piece Of Cake Easy As Pie

Piece Of Cake Easy As Pie

  
  


A furniture store a few blocks away from the drug store was closed for good. Buffy and Xander broke in. There was still an old sofa in the back. Two of its legs were broken, like if two people were carrying it, and one of the people dropped their end. Maybe on their foot.

Buffy and Xander decided to sleep off the cabdriver, and the drugstore clerk, and the pharmacist, and the pharmacist's holy water misting. They nestled on the sofa, slightly inclined, but not too uncomfortable. Seeing as they were so close, Xander made his move. Buffy looked down at his hand resting comfortably on her boob like it was some kind of a hand pillow. Buffy lifted his fingers off her boob and twisted them backwards till Xander said, "OK, OK, OK". Then they cuddled up and went to sleep.

Everything was kind of swimmy. The smoke from the grave fire smelled funny to Buffy. Willow's eyes were huge. Willow gulped then held her breath. Everything was in slow motion. Willow was chanting. Buffy could follow the curves of her mouth as they shaped every strange word. Willow was throwing some sparkly, black powder on the fire. It was kind of pretty. Buffy was smiling at her.

The look on Willow's face turned cold. She threw some of the powder into Buffy's eyes. Buffy couldn't see. She felt something cut her arm. She could feel that Willow was very close, and she grabbed her. Willow was still chanting, and Buffy felt dizzy. Buffy had to stop her. She grabbed her throat. Too hard.

Willow felt soft and small as Buffy held her. Still warm. Buffy drank her. And even when she tasted the funny taste of magic, she didn't stop. This was Willow. This was it. All they could ever have.

When Willow was empty, Buffy let her go - eyes open, hair a little over her face, a few drops of blood leaving trails on her pale skin before they dripped into the dirt.

Buffy half awoke and turned over throwing her arm over Xander's cold chest. Xander mumbled Willow's name in his sleep.

  


Not far from where Buffy and Xander slept on a broken couch, Giles stood over the grave of Buffy Summers. Once again, he held a stake in his hand and stared at a body of a young woman recently dead. This time there would be no ill-timed interruption from a grieving mother. He was ready to expertly thread the stake through her ribcage and into her heart before she awoke. Any minute now.

"Are you gonna stand there all day?" Cordelia complained from behind him. "Some us aren't dead. Or undead. Some of us have school, you know."

"This isn't easy," he said in a gravelly voice.

"Sure it is. Give me that," Cordelia said as she swiped the stake from his hand. She plunged it into Willow's chest.

"You missed the heart," Giles told her. Willow had no reaction to the intrusion. Cordelia tried again.

"Was that it?" she asked.

"No. A little to the left."

"That was it, right?"

"Yes," Giles said feeling sick. The butchering was over. The corpse had no reaction to any of the stabbing to which Cordelia had subjected it. Willow was truly dead. Giles did not feel relieved.

  


tbc


	5. I Want Candy

Bad Company: I Want Candy

  
  


As soon as the sun set, Xander and Buffy were out the door of the furniture store. They wandered aimlessly for a while waiting to bump into someone to eat. Then they saw the pink flyers. Every few blocks, they were stapled to trees and telephone poles and taped to store windows. Buffy and Xander followed the pink flyers to the church. It was a special event. Some old, balding, Christian singer neither of them had ever heard of. And it was letting out after dark. Tsk tsk.

Buffy and Xander hid in the bushes. They focused on the group of teens between the fountain and the "though shalt not park" sign. They recognized a few of them from their school.

Xander made his selection quickly. Buffy she saw him drooling a little in one girl's direction.

"Her? In the blue skirt and white top?" Buffy asked in a whisper.

"Candy Whiltfork," Xander was ready with a name. Buffy gave him a look. Xander smiled.

"Wilt over there reminds me of Willow," Xander said.

Buffy looked for any resemblance. Candy's hair was reddish blond. She was pale, and super Christian. And Willow wasn't.

"Innocence," Xander explained. Buffy rolled her eyes.

"Overrated," Buffy declared. "Are you sure you don't want the one in lavender? She looks a little slutty around the edges," Buffy said.

"I like a challenge," Xander claimed.

"No, you don't," Buffy corrected him.

"Ok. I don't, but I like Candy. Especially when it's wrapped in a sweater," Xander said with a smirk.

Buffy groaned.

"You know, she doesn't believe in sex before marriage," Xander told her as chaste Candy chattered with the church teens.

"That's so cute. Let's go eat her," Buffy said ready to go for it right in the church yard.

"You looking to go public, Buff? The cross per person ratio is a little high here. Let the churchies disperse," Xander said feeling hungry but still sensible. They watched as the kids and their chaperones said their good byes and God speeds. Candy went off with a group of kids.

"She says that God makes us sneeze so people will say God bless you," Xander helpfully quoted some more Candy wisdom as they followed her.

"What if they say gesundheit? Does that mean the Germans made us sneeze?" Buffy asked him.

The crowd with Candy thinned out. She went off on her own and right up the path to a neat little yellow house with no lights on.

"She lives one block from church? Sheesh," Xander said seeing her inconveniently arrive home sooner than he expected. He and Buffy tried to catch up.

"Don't let her get inside," Buffy warned him. But Candy was already at her door.

"Why not? I can get an invite," Xander boasted. Buffy looked very skeptical.

Candy was now safely indoors. They saw a hallway light go on, then another light, and then a lamp in her bedroom.

"The lights are on and Candy is home alone," Xander announced.

They sneaked up to the house and hid behind some shrubbery. They looked through the window. Religious statues and pictures as far as their eyes could see. Crosses all over the place. Some in Candy's room.

"You don't stand a chance. This prim, little missy won't be inviting you into her bedroom," Buffy figured seeing all the religious paraphernalia.

"You invited Angel," Xander pointed out.

"Her bed is the altar of her chastity, not a bad smutty place of carnal goings on. That's where she kneels to say her prayers," Buffy said and she mimicked the hands clasped in prayer. Xander was undaunted.

"She'll fold like my first tent. And my second tent, and all my tents ever after. Amen," Xander said.

"Blasphemer."

Xander remembered when they went on a class fieldtrip to some fish museum. Hey, it was a day off from school, who cares if they had to look at carp. On the bus, the seat next to sweet Candy was empty. Xander grabbed it. He was planning to grab more after he worked his Xander charms on her. But that seat was empty for a reason. She smiled sweetly and talked about God. It was like a horror movie – Candy's cute little body had been possessed by a TV evangelist. When the bus stopped for a pee break, she bought a little Bible and gave it to him as a gift. She inscribed it, "Let it be your guide. You are in my prayers. Candy".

"Awww. How sweet. How about a pair of your underwear, Candy? That's a gift a teenaged guy can appreciate," Xander mumbled to himself as he approached her window.

No longer human, no longer intimidated by religion – well except for crosses – Xander stood under her bedroom window. He would claim he was in a moral crisis, in desperate leg-crossing need of spiritual guidance. Hopefully she wouldn't just toss another Bible at him and send him on his way.

Xander gently knocked on the glass. He saw her jump. She stared out the window for a second in surprise. Xander waved at her in his "I am best friend material", non-threatening guy manner.

Candy opened her window. From her hiding place, Buffy listened as Xander blathered about being tempted and not wanting to stray and the Lord and bla bla. Candy went from being suspicious to sympathetic. Then Xander said, "I'm bothering you. I shouldn't have come. It's not your problem. I'm hopeless. I'll go." He turned to leave. That's when she invited him in. Xander climbed in her window eagerly. They blabbed for a while inside. Candy said something about God having a plan for every one of us. Buffy got bored. She knocked on the window.

"Who is she? Is she your girlfriend?" Candy asked Xander after getting an eyeful of Buffy.

"Get her to invite me in," Buffy said to Xander as if Candy wasn't right there. Xander pointed to Candy to show Buffy that she was right there, then he shrugged.

"Invite her in," Xander told her. "Please," he added. She looked from him to Buffy but no invite.

"It's only polite," Buffy told her.

"Come on, Candy. You can't leave her standing out there - what will the neighbors think?"

"I don't want to be in the middle," Candy told them.

"We can talk positions later," Buffy quipped, and Xander gave her a 'cool it' look.

"Please invite her in," Xander pleaded, and he gave her the eyes and the eyelashes.

"Fine, you can come in but just..." Buffy climbed through the window before Candy could finish.

"Hey, I won," Xander realized. "Plus I got you in too. Told you," he crowed while Candy gaped at him.

Buffy ignored them both as she looked around Candy's room. Buffy's room was much nicer. She kind of missed it. Lopsided couches were all well and good, but clean sheets were nothing to sneeze at.

"Are we eating or what?" Xander asked her. He turned to Candy. "I bet you taste sweet."

"Xander, you have to think of your soul. Don't let her tempt you into sin," Candy told him. She kept looking between him and Buffy. She probably didn't like Buffy touching her stuff, going through her drawers, or throwing her things on the floor. But she focused on Xander since he was the one who was eyeing her hungrily.

"You came to me because you want to do the right thing. You can make the right choice," Candy was saying with sidelong glances at Buffy like Buffy was the snake and Xander was Adam or maybe Eve or maybe he was the apple. No, Candy was the apple.

Buffy was trying out her bed. Nice and soft. It was kind of funny - Candy thought she and Buffy were in competition for Xander's soul. Buffy found herself bouncing on Candy's bed. Buffy threw her head back and laughed, giving Xander the willies.

"Quit it. That's creepy," Xander told her.

"Hey, Baby Ruth. Know what you are? You are the dead rabbit they dangle in front of the greyhounds to make them run. Xander is my dog in the race. You are dog meat, honey," Buffy explained while Candy looked confused and disgusted.

"I'd prefer not to be referred to as a dog," Xander said raising his hand.

"We're family. Bond of blood, that kind of thing," Buffy told her. Candy looked even more confused.

"Are we? So what are you my mom now?" Xander asked Buffy.

"Eeew. Shut up."

"You said family. Sister?"

"Yuck, Xander. I meant family in the vampire sense," Buffy told him.

"Vampires!" Candy gasped. She didn't look convinced.

"Yeah, like this," Xander showed her his face.

"Demons! Demons!" Candy screeched through her teeth sounding like she was hyperventilating and couldn't get enough breath for a proper scream.

"Vampires! Didn't we just discuss this?" Buffy corrected her as she let her fangs show.

Candy held her little cross in front of her – in the direction of Buffy, then in the direction of Xander, then back to Buffy, then back to Xander.

"I used to have one of those. You know what kind of dent that made when I got turned? Reason number two why a certain someone is in the dog house," Buffy told Xander. They both ignored Candy.

"You can't touch my soul," Candy proclaimed.

"Pft, soul. Who'd want to touch that?" Buffy asked her.

"Do we turn her?" Xander asked thinking that it might be nice to try his luck with her again.

"You turn her, I dust her," Buffy told him. "Bible quoted at you for all eternity."

"It might be funny."

"We'd end up with a religious vampire nut. Like Drusilla with a Bible. No!" Buffy said very firmly.

"So it's an eat and run. Or do we wait and do the whole family?" Xander wondered. In the meantime, Candy had scooted into a corner still clutching her cross.

"Hmm. I like the idea of her parents finding her all dead and drained," Buffy said.

"No!" Candy screamed

"Shhh. We're considering our options. You don't get a vote," Buffy shushed her.

"This is why we need Willow," Xander was saying.

"Shut up about Willow."

"She was good at figuring things out," Xander reminisced.

"Shut up!"

"And she would be tie breaker," Xander kept going.

"I know. We hide. We let the parents find her," Buffy suggested.

"When they go for the phone, the phone is dead," Xander added.

"Very slasher movie. Is that something we should have done already? You know, cut the phone lines?" Buffy asked. The girl whimpered.

"See, Willow would have thought of that."

"Seriously, one more word about Willow!" Buffy warned him.

She and Xander looked around Candy's room for a phone to pull out of the wall. No phone.

"Church girl doesn't even have a phone in her room. We're doing her a favor putting her out of her misery," Buffy said. Candy didn't agree.

"Let's do it," Xander said since the hunger was getting to him. And they did. Candy passed out as soon as they sank their teeth in. No stamina, but she tasted good. Afterward they looked down on her lying on the beige carpet.

They set her up in the living room, like she was watching TV. They propped her up on the couch with pillows so she would stay. Buffy fixed up her hair so it wasn't too messy and to hide the bites.

"I wish someone would do my hair," Buffy said.

Xander flipped channels.

"Infomercial?"

"Have some compassion."

"She's dead."

"Still."

"Murder, She Wrote?"

"Funny," Buffy approved. And just in time. Candy's parents, the bereaved and soon to be deceased Mr. and Mrs. Whiltfork, were coming up the driveway. Buffy and Xander stepped into a closet.

"Hi, honey, you should be in bed. Early day tomorrow," the parents said as they came in.

Candy said nothing. No "Hello Mom and Dad. How was the movie?" No "Look at the time. I was so busy praying, I didn't notice how late it was." None of that, just dead eyed staring.

"Candy, honey?"

Nothing.

"You OK?"

Then the screaming and the crying and the phone, dead like the daughter.

Buffy and Xander stepped out of hiding.

"Who are you?"

Buffy and Xander showed them who they were. Then there was praying and more screaming, and too soon, it was all over.

  


To be continued


	6. Comforts Of Home

Bad Company: Comforts Of Home

  
  


Buffy woke up with her head under white, lace trimmed sheets and a fluffy comforter. She poked her head out cautiously. It was nighttime. She had slept the day away in Candy's bed. Hair clips, pink nail polish, and a statue of Mary and baby Jesus stood on the nightstand. Buffy looked up at the ceiling. It was all so familiar, not the religious statuary, but the rest. It was like a Sunday morning, except it was night, like she was lying in her own bed except she wasn't. Smelling pancakes or waffles or at least coffee being made, except she was smelling corpses hours old stashed in the same closet Buffy and Xander had used to hide.

Xander was sleeping in the master bedroom. He had valiantly and predictably tried to get into bed with Buffy, but she kicked him out. Buffy went to look for him. The blinds in there were drawn tight, and Xander was spread eagle on the bed taking full advantage of the king-sized mattress. Buffy threw decorative pillows, John Grisham books, and the phone at him until he woke up with a startled "What?".

"I want to go home," she told him.

  


Giles calculated that if Joyce had gone to work that day, she would be home by now. Many of her neighbors were pulling into their driveways, carrying briefcases, takeout bags. Their kids spilled out of minivans toting backpacks. Giles walked past them like a black cloud. He shrank from them as if his presence were a poison gas. He saw Joyce's car in front of the house. He realized he had been hoping to miss her.

She would hear, Giles knew. He couldn't let the news just reach her. He dreaded telling her. He had already seen Mr. and Mrs. Rosenberg fall apart in grief. He knocked on her door softly, resolved to leave if she didn't hear. But she did. Joyce looked at him with her big, empty eyes, and he stepped back from the threshold. He couldn't say it.

"What now? What?" she demanded.

"I'm afraid it's Willow," he told her.

"No." She slammed the door. Then she opened it again.

"What is going on?"

Giles shook his head. That he couldn't tell her though he had a responsibility to warn her in case Buffy showed up. Not that it would do any good. She wouldn't believe him. Joyce invited him in. He had to tell her not to do that once it got dark. Not to do that if her dead daughter showed up. But he didn't because it was useless. If Buffy showed up, Joyce would let her in.

Joyce gave him a drink without asking. When he emptied his glass, she refilled it and her own too. They kept drinking until they were both crying. Time passed. They watched the line of golden liquor get lower in the bottle. Time passed. They switched to vodka – chilled, from the freezer, the good kind. Time passed. It was dark. There was a knock at the door.

  


To be continued


	7. Knock Knock

Bad Company: Knock Knock

The knock on the front door of the Summers house went unanswered for several minutes. Joyce looked up from her empty glass and tried to identify the strange noise. The alcohol soaked synapses in Giles' brain sputtered feebly, but he muster up enough brainpower to figure out the mysterious noise before Joyce got up to answer.

"I'll get that," Giles told Joyce. He stood up unsteadily. She shrugged and refilled her glass.

On the way over Buffy had been practicing her most innocent 'invite me in' face. It might have been even 'a cry with joy, hug me, and invite me in' face. It was that good. Buffy only had Xander's word for that though.

Buffy was ready to say "Mom" in her most childish and plaintive tones. But that just didn't seem like the right thing to do when Giles answered the door. It threw her off. She croaked "Giles!" and grimaced at him. "What are you doing here?"

At first glance Giles might have looked like regular Giles, but on close inspection, there was the slight slouch, the loosened collar, and the overwhelming reek of booze breath when he spoke. Buffy narrowed her eyes suspiciously at this notGiles.

"You naughty girl," Giles said and wagged his finger at Buffy. "What big teeth you have. Have you come to eat your poor mother? Well, I'll have none of that. She's about 70 proof by now, and you're not old enough to drink." He wobbled a little as if the act of speech or maybe the finger wagging sent him off balance.

"Giles," Buffy choked out not knowing what else to say.

Giles just stared at her trying not to sway too much. Joyce showed up over Giles's shoulder. Her big eyes stared at Buffy for a minute.

"It's a ghost, Rupert," Joyce concluded. "Do you see her? Oh, my baby is a ghost now. I think I better sit down."

Joyce leaned her back against a wall then slid down slowly. She seemed a little surprised when her butt hit the floor as if during the sliding process she had forgotten what she was doing and what the end result would be.

"Mom," Buffy said managing a sort of plaintive tone, still hoping her mom would invite her in before she passed out.

"Hi, honey," Joyce said

Joyce didn't pass out. Giles turned all the way around looking for her and almost tripped over his own feet. When he looked down, the way people do when they want to find something to blame for their embarrassing clumsiness, he found Joyce. He said "hello" to her in a goofy way.

"Are they drunk?" Xander asked. He had been hanging back to let Buffy have center stage during the touching family reunion.

"Who's that?" Giles asked.

Xander waved and smiled.

"Xander? Of course. I knew you would get yourself in a mess. Look at you," Giles scolded.

"Yeah, I'm a vampire."

"Willow?" Giles asked looking from Xander to Buffy like he wanted to know which dog had pooped the carpet.

"Buffy did it," Xander said and pointed an accusing finger at her.

"Hey! Well, I was going to turn her," Buffy told Giles.

"A great favor, I'm sure," Giles said. He looked from Buffy back to Xander like he was inspecting her handiwork. Then he concluded, "She's better off than you two."

"No she isn't. She's dead," Xander complained making Buffy roll her eyes.

"So are you. Breathe on a mirror sometime if you aren't convinced," Giles told him.

"We aren't alive but we are remarkably lifelike and... You two are drunk," Buffy said, and Joyce hiccuped in confirmation.

"Oh, yeah. I'd say on the scale of tipsy to hospitalized due to alcohol poisoning, they are sloshed maybe even plastered," Xander said after casting an expert's eye on them.

"It's the grief. They are grieving," Buffy said.

Joyce was still sitting on the floor. Her long legs formed a V on the foyer floor. Giles was using her head for support, leaning his hand on top of it. Joyce tried to slap his hand away, but her aim wasn't too good. Giles shifted and used the door for support. Joyce kept on slapping the air above her head.

"They look like they are having a good time with the grieving," Xander told Buffy.

"We've been having a great time," Joyce agreed. "Rupert is a wonderful drinker. Your father was never any good at it, dear. I wonder what Rupert is like in bed?"

"That's the grief talking," Buffy assured Xander.

"That's the booze talking," Xander told her. Then he turned to Giles. "Hear that, Giles? You should go for it. Joyce is an attractive woman."

"Xander, if you keep talking like that you'll be grit on the driveway. Why are we still standing out here anyway?" Buffy wondered.

"Because you haven't gotten the invite yet," Xander reminded her.

"Well, I expected a teary eyed 'thank God you're alive' welcome from my Mom not a 'do me, Giles, do me now' scaring for life," Buffy said.

"Oh, come on, we can get two drunk, middle aged people to invite us in," Xander said encouragingly.

"No. They spoiled it. It's all wrong. Adults suck. I need some emery boards," Buffy said as she walked away looking glum.

"What?" Xander wondered as he followed Buffy down her driveway.

"Did Xander say he was a vampire?" They could hear Joyce ask as they left. They didn't hear the answer just the front door slam behind them.

"Did you say emery boards?" Xander asked Buffy.

She did. The two of them were back at the all night pharmacy to get them. Except the pharmacy wasn't all night any more.

"Hey, it's closed. And the open 24 hours sign is gone," Buffy said as she peered into the darkened store.

"In Sunnydale, it was like putting up an all you can eat sign," Xander said. As if to illustrate his point, a vampire sauntered up to the door.

"Slayer," the vampire hissed on seeing Buffy.

"Former," Buffy said back at him. She flashed him her teeth. "I took early retirement."

The vampire shrugged like vamped slayers are a dime a dozen. The closed pharmacy got way more of his attention. Undaunted by the closed sign, the vampire banged on the door anyway.

"What? You out of toilet paper?" Xander asked him as the pharmacy door shook from the violence.

"Maybe there is another store," Buffy speculated.

"There isn't. This was the last all night drug store in Sunnydale," the vampire told them still banging on the door like he thought some sleepy eyed pharmacist was going to shuffle over and open it if the vamp was really really persistent and noisy about it.

"Pharmacists taste all mediciny anyway," Buffy said. "There's an aftertaste just like a dentist's office smell."

"You did this! You did this!" the vampire said with outrage having realized that Buffy was responsible for the new store hours. "Now the place closes at ten."

"So what? Ten is after sunset. You like to sleep in, I'm guessing," Buffy told him.

"You newbie!" He spit out. And there was actual spit flying. "You're supposed to eat the customers not the staff."

"Oh," Buffy said realizing the error of her ways. Then she staked him.

"You haven't given that up?" Xander asked as he waved away vampire particles. It seemed like bad luck to get dead vampire on you.

"What? Staking? He was annoying," Buffy said pocketing her stake.

"Isn't even carrying a stake kind of tacky now?"

"Like socks with sandals?"

"Yeah. What's next a garlic wreath around the neck? Eu du holy water behind the ears?"

"Emery boards, Xander," Buffy reminded him.

"You really wanted emery boards? I thought it was code for something, like drinking someone to death."

"Don't mention drinking to me," Buffy grumbled.

For a moment they stood silent, their hair and clothes sprinkled with vampire dust.

"So, going to the Bronze is out of the question?" Xander asked.

But it wasn't out of the question. Buffy's eyes lit up at the idea. Literally, they turned yellow and glowed, making Xander smile.

To be continued 


	8. Sensational

Bad Company: Sensational

  
  


Xander and Buffy walked toward the Bronz like any two young people out for a night of fun. But there was something about the way they moved, the way they looked ahead. There was anticipation without the normal fear. To their eyes, the night wasn't dark any more. A black shimmer covered everything. The night didn't hide anything from them. It was as welcoming as black, silk sheets. When they thought of the glaring daylight, they just wanted to climb into those sheets and close their eyes.

A young couple passed by a little drunk, leaning on each other. Xander could feel his teeth as he smiled at the thought of following them, surprising them as they fumbled for their car keys. He could hear them argue about who had the keys last. Then they remembered they were taken away. They both cursed, their words overlapping. Xander's attention wandered away from them as he heard two women laugh shrilly somewhere up ahead.

People were different now, more alive, more enticing, more approachable. Sometimes it was hard to pass up so many. Even when Xander wasn't hungry, there was a pull that each live human being exerted. It was like their veins were strings tied around his teeth. Sort of like his old 24-7 teen boy in his prime sex drive. Not that he was rid of that. Oh, no. Xander still had that drive, and now this new one - sometimes both at the same time.

Always hungry and horny. How was this better than being alive? Oh, that's right - the superstrength, the immortality, and Buffy. He and Buffy were the same now, right? Except they weren't. She was a slayer turned vampire, and she still wouldn't give him any.

Walking toward the Bronz, he thought of Willow. She should have made up a third. It should have been the three of them walking down the slick, midnight streets toward the club, the noises and the smell growing stronger with every step. He could almost see Willow next to him, turning to give him a smile when he looked at her. When he looked backwards, she had always been there. A scared, little kid, growing up, taking every step with him. When he looked ahead, he knew she should have been there, maybe forever. He looked over at Buffy and wondered if she had any real regrets, if she was capable of them any more.

  


Buffy listened to their shoes against the pavement - the lower thuds of Xander's heavier footsteps and her lighter, sharper clicks. There were all sorts of little noises from everywhere – rustling, dripping, scratching - mostly small animals and other gross things. Far off she could hear voices. A few came to her unmuffled by walls, the others were behind closed doors with music mixed in. They were close.

When they walked into the Bronz, the noise and the smells hit her all at once. The mix was a rush of young flesh and blood, the smell of drinks and bodies. She stood back and watched the slow motion of people trying to make their way through the crowded floor. It was like someone was slowly mixing a human feast. Then she started to pick out familiar faces. A few of them met her eyes for a second, looked surprised, then turned away, and lost themselves in the mass of warm bodies.

  
  
To be continued 


	9. Miss And Miss And Hit

Bad Company: Miss and Miss and Hit

  
  


Amidst the milling throng of young people, Buffy picked out a guy and a girl nursing beers and watching the crowd. They stuck out like ice sculptures on a buffet table - cold and inedible. Buffy stalked over to their table.

"You two, scram," she said. Her thumb pointed to the door.

"Slayer," the girl vamp hissed. The other vampire stood up like he was ready for a fight.

"Maybe I should stake them too, for old times sake," Buffy proposed to Xander.

Xander hung his head, looking kind of embarrassed. The two other vampires had just enough time to realize that Buffy and Xander weren't human any more.

"There's plenty for everyone," the male vampire pointed out the Bronze full of kids. The female vampire grudgingly nodded in agreement.

"I want to eat some old classmates, and I don't want you two slobbering all over my dinner," Buffy told them. They looked at each other, then at Buffy and Xander.

"This place stinks anyway." They sniffed the air in Buffy's direction and went to eat somewhere else.

Buffy and Xander took their seats. They dumped the other vamps' drinks and ordered new ones. They sipped. They looked around finding familiar faces, disbelieving stares, and deliberately averted eyes.

"We're getting the 'hey, didn't I go to your funeral' look," Buffy noticed.

"Have I been declared dead? Nah. I'll be one of those 'He changed, dropped out, and you never see him in the daylight' guys," Xander said not too bothered that people who were avoiding him before he was dead were avoiding him now. He just looked them over, picking out the most delicious ones. Still, something was bothering him - there wasn't another set of legs at the table.

"I wish Willow was here," Xander said with a big sigh. Being at the Bronze brought so many memories - good times, bad times, mediocre times.

Buffy set down her glass with a bang.

"That's it, buddy. I'm staking you," she declared. Xander just kept on sighing, looking at his beer.

"I can't believe how much I miss her," he went on like Buffy's glass banging meant nothing to him. "We used to sit at this very table. And that one. And that one. And sometimes over there." Xander pointed to various tables.

"Would you shut up about tables. And Willow!"

"Would you shut up about staking?" Xander went on the attack reminding her of her unvimpirly behavior. "You know I have a shot at cool now. But no. I'm here with a former slayer. It's like hanging out with that kid who eats his own boogers."

Buffy was so appalled for a second that she was speechless. She decided a punch to the arm could speak for her. Xander rubbed his arm absently. He looked around the room. All the succulent high-schoolers seemed miles away. They were only flies hitting the windshield. He was in the car travelling on and on.

"It's kind of boring isn't it - living forever?" Xander said to Buffy. Buffy gaped at the ingratitude.

"Can you wait a few decades? Or, you know, a week, before you start bitching about eternal life?"

"Buffy? I can't believe you would show your face here," Buffy heard from behind her. When she turned, she saw Cordelia towering over her. "You have some nerve. I went to your funeral, you know."

"How was it?" Buffy was eager to know.

Cordelia shrugged - not a promising start.

"A waste of time. You know, below average like your wardrobe," Cordy elaborated.

Buffy turned to Xander with an accusing look.

"It was sad," he assured her. "Very sad. Tons of sobbing, rending of garments, more sobbing, wailing, sobbing. It was a grief-fest. We did you proud, Buff." And it was true. It just didn't sound true coming from his mouth.

"You better have," Buffy warned him.

"I knew we should have staked you," Cordelia said with her arms folded.

"How come you didn't?" Buffy asked looking at both Xander and Cordelia, thinking that Cordelia would do it without blinking an eye.

"You seemed so dead." Xander shrugged. He vaguely remembered having some intestinal objections to plunging a piece of wood into the corpse of his best friend. He also remembered thinking it was a good idea overall, just as long as someone else did it, and he didn't have to watch. The sentiment went around. There was dragging of feet, and general procrastination and squeamishness. Until it was too late.

"They wussed out," Cordelia summed up.

"And your mom was hanging all over your corpse," Xander jumped in.

"Oh, that's so sweet."

"Giles was going to go ahead and do it, but your mom kind of interrupted," Cordelia continued.

"Good old mom," Buffy said, approving.

"Then this kid death monster at the hospital kept us busy," Xander added.

"So you guys just flaked," Buffy said. She was unreasonably disappointed in their negligence.

"Pretty much," Xander admitted. Then he sidled up to Cordy and whispered in her ear.

"You wanna?" He shrugged his shoulders while tilting his head. A hopeful smile playing with the corner of his lip.

"No," Cordelia said.

"But we..."

"No," Cordelia repeated.

"We are not officially broken up you know," Xander reminded her. Like a technicality was going to get her in the sack.

"You're dead. We're broken up."

Meanwhile, Buffy was looking at Cordy admiringly. Her hair was perfect. Her makeup was flawless. God knows what Buffy looked like. From the up and down, dismissive, 'you look like crap' look Cordy was giving her, it was hard to tell. Cordy always gave everyone that look.

"Xander," Buffy said and pulled Xander off to the side.

"I want to turn her," Buffy told him.

"Let me think about that. Cordelia Chase for eternity. Do you hate me? Do you want to hurt me?" Xander was not enthusiastic about the plan.

"You made out with her," Buffy reminded him.

"Yeah, but I am deader and wiser now."

"You were making moves on her just two seconds ago," Buffy reminded him some more.

"Eternity, Buffy. An eternity with Cordelia."

"I need someone to do my hair," Buffy whined.

Xander quickly came up with a plan.

"We'll turn a hairdresser."

Buffy liked the plan.

"A professional? Hmm. I need a manicure too."

"A manicurist, a pedicurist, whatever. We'll turn a whole beauty salon. Just no Cordy. Now let's eat her," Xander decided.

They both turned to where Cordelia was standing. Except she wasn't standing there any more.

"Where did she go?" Buffy wondered.

"She ditched us."

"Damn it."

"You're the one who wanted a sidebar in the middle of a meet and eat," Xander pointed out since Buffy was looking at him with blame.

They went out just in case they could catch up to her. She wasn't around. But the two jettisoned vamps were in the alley. Each one was clutching a Bronze patron, ready to bite down. The Bronze dumpster must have been giving off an irresistibly appetizing aroma.

Buffy put her hands on her hips. Xander groaned knowing she was getting ready for some slaying. The vamps growled at her like dogs protecting their dinner. The male vamp shoved his pray into the wall so he could fight. His female victim was stunned for a moment then screaming.

"Shh," Buffy told her.

The male vamp kicked Buffy. She caught his foot and flipped him over. He ended up back on his feet, staggering, while Buffy landed some punches. Once he got his balance back, he landed a few in return. Then Buffy staked him right through the ribs.

Xander stalked toward the girl vampire. The girl vamp didn't seem too concerned about her buddy. She backed up. She was keeping the guy she was about to munch on between her and Xander, like a shield or a bribe, Xander couldn't tell. Buffy's guy was dust so she turned her back on him as he finished dispersing. Buffy scaled the dumpster, jumped from one edge to the other and landed behind the girl vamp. She staked her in the back.

"Neat, huh?" Buffy preened.

Xander caught the club-goer before he hit the dirt as the death grip around his throat disappeared when his attacker turned into a cloud of dust. Buffy caught his date as she was about to run away.

"Where's the gratitude?" Buffy asked her.

The girl stammered a thank you.

"You are welcome," Buffy said with a smile and a bite to the neck.

  
  


To be continued


	10. Interruption

Bad Company: Interruption

  
  


The early morning sun made an unwelcome entry into the Summers' living room. Joyce was on the sofa either passed out or asleep or some enviable combination of both. Giles slumped in the armchair. He wished he were unconscious, but he was at that stage of inebriation when the alcohol was only making him sick. Alternately, he wished he could throw it all up - the booze and everything that happened since the first drink. That way he wouldn't have to see the corpse of his slayer standing at the door, speaking in Buffy's voice, Xander standing with her like a mockery of their living friendship. He wouldn't have to see the one who wasn't there, the one Giles made sure was dead. He wouldn't have to hear them speak about her casually after they had killed her. All those things were now finally making their proper impression through the thick barrier of alcohol. If he could only throw it up.

Joyce's arm hung from the edge of the sofa. It looked pale, lifeless. Her breathing was imperceptible. Giles assured himself that she was just sleeping. Joyce woke up suddenly saying Buffy's name, startling Giles. She rushed off to the bathroom to throw up.

  


Buffy had been taken to the morgue, her mother notified of her death. All this before Giles could make his way to her. In the morgue hallway, he watched Joyce. She looked sick, nearly doubled over from pain. Giles didn't approach her. He didn't offer his condolences. He hid. He watched the door, waiting for his chance.

Joyce was led away - forms had to be signed. Giles sneaked into the cold, bare room. Buffy was there, covered now. Giles removed the sheet from her face. It was her. She was very still, her skin a grayish white. He brushed the hair back that the sheet had disarranged. The bite on her neck stood revealed. He pulled the stake from his jacket. He held it firmly, positioned it over her heart. He pulled back to strike but didn't. She would be gone forever once the stake plunged through the sheet into her chest. How could that be better? He looked at the marks on her neck. They were his answer.

"Buffy," Giles said as if he needed her to agree.

"It's her," Joyce said from the door. Giles hardly recognized her voice. He wondered how long he had stood there motionless with the hand holding the stake hanging down at his side. He put the stake away quickly. He couldn't explain what he was about to do, worse, he couldn't explain why. Not to her mother.

Giles tried to speak, to say all those meaningless things people say to the bereaved, but his throat was closed. Joyce was leaning against the morgue door, her wet eyes on Buffy. Giles thought to cover Buffy's face again. But that wouldn't be right. He couldn't hide her from her mother any more.

  


Joyce was no longer retching in the bathroom. Giles heard water running. He stood up slowly letting dizziness and nausea wash over him. The bathroom door was opening. Giles realized that he should have been gone already. He was too slow again. Last night they had faced the results of his inaction - whatever was left of Buffy mixed with something evil, just enough of the girl she had been to rip them to pieces, but nothing more.

Giles gathered his coat, himself. He didn't look at Joyce. She was a just a silhouette in the doorway.

"If she comes again, don't admit her. Please," Giles said as he paused on the front step. He then he left without ever meeting Joyce's eyes.

  
  
To be continued 


	11. No Rest For The Wicked

Bad Company: No Rest For The Wicked

  
  


Well before sunrise, Buffy and Xander broke into a nice, big house with a pool. The occupants were disappointingly out of town. The instructions on feeding the cat were by the front door, also a note about giving the cat its pill. It said "careful, he bites".

"Our kind of cat," Xander said. But the cat was nowhere to be seen, probably hiding under the bed or something.

Buffy idly wondered what cat tasted like as they went through the overdecorated rooms. Furry and scratchy maybe?

"Nice!" Buffy said as they walked into an airy, tropically furnished room overlooking the pool. She settled into a cushy, wicker armchair as the pool set up a watery pattern on the walls.

"It's the sun room, Buffy," Xander told her.

"I know," she said defensively. Actually she had forgotten about the sun for an incy wincy second.

"It has a skylight." Xander pointed up. Palm fronds were brushing the sky light glass.

"It's still night, you big baby," Buffy huffed and got up.

Xander quickly found a room with less sun exposure and a gorgeous view of a giant TV. Seated on the L-shaped sofa, he had his feet on the hideous but no doubt way expensive coffee table and was already test-driving the remote control. The room wasn't nearly as nice as the sunroom, but it wasn't going to fry them to a crisp as they slept so that was a bonus.

"Wonder when the cat-sitter shows up?" Xander asked Buffy, itching for a snack as he flipped the channels.

"Not at quarter to dawn," Buffy guessed and flopped down next to him.

"We have a little munchie to look forward to." Xander flipped past the infomercials until he hit on a cartoon.

"That was just like the old days," Buffy said. She was thinking back to the alley skirmish. Leaning her head on Xander's shoulder, she curled her legs under her.

"You mean the old days like last Thursday? Those old days?"

The cartoon turned into a commercial. Buffy closed her eyes.

"Killing vampires, rescuing people," Buffy reminisced.

"Being vampires. Eating people we rescue," Xander reminded her. "I don't think you're very good at this being a vampire. You have it confused with your old job." Xander was flipping channels again. This time he stopped on a spandexed blonde arching over some kind of exercise/torture device.

"Everything I know about vampires is from the killing them perspective," Buffy defended herself. She tried to grab the remote but Xander kept it out of her reach. If she had been willing to budge from the sofa, he wouldn't stand a chance.

"And the making out with them perspective."

"Just one," Buffy said pouting at the thought of Angel.

"And look what that got you. And speaking of STD's..."

"We weren't speaking of STD's!"

"But since I brought it up. Is that something we should be worrying about? And what about mono?" Xander asked.

"One track mind much?" Buffy pointed to the blonde on TV who was posing to show off her abs and/or boobs.

"Hey, I'm going to be a teenager forever, I need to know the pros and cons." Xander switched the channel as the view changed to muscly guy abs and muscly guy boobs. Buffy tried for the remote again. Xander kept custody with his longer arms.

"Can vampires get the cold or worse flu?" Buffy worried thinking back to the snot lady.

"You see any vampires with the whooping cough?"

"I don't take their temperatures. I just stake them. They might all be doped up on antihistamines for all I know."

"Vampires with seasonal allergies. That's not in the brochure."

"There is no brochure! There should be a brochure. I, for one, want to know if vampires can get fat. Should I only be eating skinny people? And how many skinny people? How many calories are in blood, anyway?" Watching the exercise commercial made her worry about that kind of thing.

"We need to know stuff," Xander agreed though his mind was still on STD's and not calories.

"Can vampires get fat? Can vampires get pimples? Can vampires get plastic surgery," Buffy listed her concerns counting them off on her fingers.

"Can vampires get herpes?" Xander added. The issue was of great concern to him.

Buffy rolled her eyes.

"Eternal herpes, Buff."

"Who do we know that knows stuff?" Buffy asked.

"Willow," Xander said without a second's pause.

"Who do we know that knows stuff and is still alive?"

"Giles. But he won't tell us."

"He'll tell me. He's my watcher."

"I think that relationship, like mine with Cordy, does not survive death."

"Pft, death. You know what's stronger than death?" Buffy didn't give Xander a chance to answer. "Guilt. And no one can guilt like the dead."

With that decided, they settled on the sofa. Xander took the short part of the L like a gentleman. The living room vertical blinds were tightly drawn over the glass doors. After they turned off the TV, they could hear the pool water splashing softly. Vampire hearing was kind of nice.

  


Vampire hearing sucked. Xander was sleeping with a nubby throw pillow jammed under his chin when Buffy jabbed him with her foot. She squirmed and poked Xander with her toes until he opened his eyes.

"How am I supposed to sleep the day away with all that noise?" Buffy asked.

Xander focused and identified the noise that hadn't woken him up.

"It's the lawn guy. He starts early." Xander covered his ear with the throw pillow and tried to go back to sleep.

"An early starting lawn guy. He deserves to die," Buffy decided sitting up on her side of the sofa. Xander raised his head and confirmed that it was morning. There was a distinct outline of sunlight around the edges of the closed blinds.

"How do we get him in here?" he asked.

Buffy looked at him like it was obvious. Xander continued to stare at her. Buffy struck a seductive pose to give him a clue. The light bulb finally came on over Xander's head.

"Feminine wiles."

Buffy straightened her clothes a little. She stood just inside the open front door and yelled about a million times without being heard over the lawnmower. She sighed, took the seductive pose again and waited for the guy to stop mowing. When he did, she waved him over. He only waved back until she emphatically beckoned with her finger. He came over all business like. Maybe he expected her to tell him to trim the hedge or something.

"Can you come in here and help me with something," Buffy asked in a sweet and breathless voice.

"My shoes are all..." he pointed at his shoes covered with bits of grass.

"It's ok. We have a maid, probably," Buffy guessed.

He was still reluctant to mess up the floor.

Xander poked his head out of the living room even thought he wasn't supposed to.

"The cat's stuck behind the TV," Xander piped up. "It's a monster of a thing. The TV, I mean. The cat too," Xander said as he spotted a picture of a middle aged lady holding a fat kitty.

Buffy saw the guy's eyes light up when they landed on Xander. He wiped his feet and walked in eagerly. Buffy watched the guy push back his hair. He wasn't bad looking, though a little sweaty and dirty. His t-shirt stuck to him but not to bad effect. While Buffy checked him out, he had looked at her like she was linoleum. That's all the clue Buffy needed. She was scorching hot - there was no doubt about that. Buffy tried to check herself out in a mirror she passed. Nothing. She cursed under her breath. She was never going to get used to the mirror thing.

The guys made introductions. Buffy stayed back. Xander wondered if he should give a fake name then he remembered that he wasn't a burglar, and this guy wasn't going to be filling out a police report.

"That TV looks pretty big. Hope the cat's OK," the lawn guy, whose name was Manny, said.

"The cat is fine," Xander said. He was starting to notice how the guy was looking at him. It was weird to have food looking at you like that. Or like anything. Buffy smiled behind Manny, a smile that said, "I am going to eat this guy but only after he makes Xander totally uncomfortable".

"You house-sitting then?" Manny asked, in no hurry to move a honking, big TV when he could just stand there and make eyes at Xander.

"Yeah, that's right," Xander said, in no hurry to pounce on the guy and give him the wrong idea. He waited for Buffy to start things off, but Buffy was smirking.

"I bet you're hot." Buffy said the word hot with all the hotness she could manage. "I'll get you a cold drink."

Xander spared her a glare.

Buffy went in search of the kitchen. It wasn't far so she could still hear the conversation and imagine Xander shifting uncomfortably. Buffy noticed all the stainless steel appliances gleaming, reflecting back an empty kitchen. She had the urge to pinch herself to make sure she was really there. The cat must have heard the refrigerator opening, and there he was rubbing against her legs.

"Want some soda, kitty?" Buffy whispered.

The kitty did not want soda.

"So do you go to Sunnydale U?" Manny asked.

"Me? No. I..." Xander started to answer when the cat meowed from the kitchen.

"I could have sworn... Must have been a really big fur ball back there," Xander said pointing at the back of the TV and scratching his head.

Manny looked at him funny, and not funny like before. He looked back at Buffy coming from the kitchen with a frozen smile and a can of soda. The cat twirled around her ankles. Xander didn't wait for Manny's festering suspicions to turn into getting the hell out of there. Xander lunged and bit the lawn guy's sweaty neck while his head was turned. Buffy dropped the soda and rushed over before Xander could bogart the guy.

  


The floor was sticky where the soda had spilled. The lawn guy's corpse cooled at their feet as Xander and Buffy lounged on the plush carpet, looking through a stack of magazines. The dead guy's blood was staining the carpet with the few leftover drops.

"Did you see how he was into you?" Buffy said as she patted the dead guy's shoulder. Bits of grass were stuck to his t-shirt. Xander ignored her.

"You know this means you're gay," Buffy said while she quickly flipped through page after page telling her which swimsuit was right for her.

"A little flirting doesn't make me gay?" Xander said. He was also looking at swimsuits and giving them his full attention. He held up the catalog to prove his point.

"Drinking the blood of a vampire made you a vampire so..."

"You drank from him too. So you're a gay guy now?"

"A little bit," Buffy said not willing to give up her argument.

"So did drinking the blood of a pharmacist make you a pharmacist?"

Buffy shrugged.

"You're just jealous of my attractive powers. That guy couldn't resist walking straight into my waiting straight jaws," Xander told her. Then he had an idea. "Hey, since we are both gay guys now, want to do it?"

Buffy didn't get to answer as they heard a key in the door, a meow, and then a voice saying "Who's a good kitty?" as the front door slammed closed.

"I think we're about to turn into cat sitters," Buffy said as she jumped up and her magazine flipped closed in front of the staring eyes of the corpse.

  
  
To be continued 


	12. Strategy

Bad Company: Strategy

  
  


Cordelia sashayed into the library, looking around at the gloom. It was extra depressing in there with everybody dead or vamped, plus the books. She tapped her fingers on the counter while she waited for Giles to walk out of his office, wiping his glasses. He didn't. She peered in and saw him slouched in a chair. His collar was open. He was pasty. He looked half-dead. It was still better than many of the rest of the people she used to know.

"I saw them VampBuffy and VampXander," Cordelia announced as she barged into the office. She didn't tiptoe in. She didn't lower her voice to spare his hung over ears. And he was hung over - there was a smell. She and Giles were both alive, and she was going to act like it. Her life affirming, rude entrance and grating tone got no reaction from Giles.

"I think the naming might be redundant. They are now the only Buffy and Xander," Giles finally told her.

"Whatever you want to call them, they've been busy," she said. She considered them for a moment, reappraised them. "The way Buffy looked, it's a good thing she'll be keeping to the more flattering dim lighting. Xander's almost sexy. Almost. Still plenty dorky. Shouldn't the vamping take care of that?"

"It's not an injection of cool, Cordelia," Giles sounded almost angry.

"It kind of is. Body temperature wise."

Giles straightened up and leaned his elbows on his desk. He found his glasses and put them on. That was more like it.

"Where did you see them?" he asked.

"Bronz. I think they were looking for a bite."

"You obviously escaped unscathed." He looked up at her with no expression.

"I took myself off the menu. They can't afford me. I am like caviar. Or maybe something that doesn't smell fishy." After giving that a thought, she continued with her report. "There was some action in the neighborhood. A fight, and Barry and Trish dead. They were going to break up anyway. Barry was still hung up on his ex and she's a ..."

"Cordelia."

"Right. So is there a new slayer on the way? I don't mean to be all callous, but I'm pretty much callous, or I'm not here. So when's the next slayer shipment?"

"I don't know. Slayer deployment is not in my control." Giles looked past her through the door. Maybe it was a hint that she should leave. She was Cordelia Chase, she didn't take hints. But she did want to leave before the gross, book smell got all over her.

"You put in an order for a new slayer, right? The daylight social activities are very limited. Daytime dating, what is that? You have to do something."

"I may not be here to do anything. If the Council of Watchers decides..."

"You can't leave! Have you seen Oz? He looks exactly like Oz. Except he's gone from monosyllabic to vow of silence. I saw him sitting at Willow's desk. Class is over. He walks in. Sits down. The teacher gets spooked, and she's out of there. He's a time bomb. And the full moon is going to happen sometime this month, right?"

"In 4 days."

"Someone needs to keep the guy chained up."

"You think he'll allow it?"

"He's a wee, tiny guy. Right now, you can take him. Sneak up, club him over the head. Wait till the full moon, and you'll have fur flying."

"Is that the right thing to do?" Giles looked about a million years old. Cordy hated to see people age prematurely.

"What else? Vampire vs werewolf? That's an old timey, horror flick," Cordy looked duly horrified as she said it. She was picturing her future. "That's what I'll be reduced to - late night television. Or I'll have to take up reading!"

"No doubt John Grisham will be flying off the shelves," Giles said. But his heart wasn't in it. The superior, British attitude was strained.

"Snap out of it!" Cordy yelled. He only looked annoyed at her shrieking. "Other people matter. Like me."

"Yes. Most of all to yourself."

"Well, duh. Do a head count. We are down three of our guys. And worse - Buffy and Xander have gone from the plus column to the minus column. I'm no math geek, but we are like worse than broke right now. We are in the red. If you get a slayer here, we can at least pay off the interest."

"You are a very resilient girl."

Cordy considered him for a second. He was rubbing his eyes so she had trouble reading his expression. She played the odds and decided that he probably wasn't complimenting her.

"You are calling me a cold hearted bitch, aren't you? Just because I don't wallow." She shrugged. She didn't act heartbroken. It wasn't her style.

"I admire you. I wish you the best," Giles said dead seriously. Cordelia shuddered.

"What kind of way to talk is that? Cut it out!" she said, freaked, and left the library. She didn't go by the class where she left Oz sitting just in case he was still sitting there. She didn't want to see that.

  
  
To be continued 


	13. Night Watcher

Bad Company: Night Watcher

  
  


Xander broke the lock to the doors of the school with his bare hands. The vandalism felt good even though it was a flimsy lock. Protecting the student body wasn't a Sunnydale School Board priority. Keeping the gruesome deaths hushed up was.

A kick and the double doors slammed open. The school was dark. The exit signs shone bright red. Xander and Buffy's footsteps squeaked loudly through the empty hallways.

They entered the library with obnoxious "hello's". The stacks gaped dark as empty graves. There was no light in Giles's office. But he was there. Buffy and Xander could sense him. That was kind of nifty.

"It looks smaller," Buffy announced as she peered around the library.

"Looks the same to me," Xander told her.

"You look smaller, too, Giles," Buffy said as she came into his office.

"It's my irrelevance."

Buffy saw his hand lingering under his desk.

"What do you think he has under there?" Buffy asked drawing Xander's attention to Giles and whatever he was hiding under his desk. Xander opened his mouth, but Buffy answered her own question before Xander could say something gross and inappropriate.

"Cross bow? Mini crossbow? Spear gun?" Buffy guessed.

Xander didn't wait for Buffy to add any more items to that shopping list. He jumped back and hid behind a doorjamb.

Buffy turned her head to Xander. She was going to ask him if he thought she could catch a flying arrow in her hand. That's when an arrow came flying from a hidden hole in the desk. Buffy bent her upper body, twisted a little, and caught the arrow before it ruined her top.

Xander applauded. Buffy took a bow. She turned back to Giles in time to see his expression. There was no expression. But his hands were busy. He fumbled trying to reload. Buffy swooshed over.

"I'm going to have to confiscate that." She ripped the crossbow from under the desk. "You can get it back after class, young man. And write 2000 words on why you shouldn't be playing with sharp objects," Buffy said as she snapped the crossbow in two. Giles watched but didn't react.

"With the target practice out of the way, now we can have a nice visit," Buffy said, cheerfully and seated herself opposite Giles. She smiled. His expression was still blank. He was looking at the spot where she had been standing when he tried to shoot her. She waved her hand in front of his face.

"I'm over here now, Giles. Keep up."

"No, you're not." His eyes stayed unfocused.

"Yes, I am. And I have questions. First, can Vampires catch people diseases?"

"You are a disease," Giles said without looking at her.

"Giles," Buffy whined. "I mean like flu or measles or chicken pox. Oh, God, I could get all pockmarked."

"Not if you don't scratch," Xander told her. He pulled up a chair next to Buffy's and took a seat.

"Xander wants to know about STD's."

"Buffy wants to know about vampire dieting," Xander tattled. "Is there a Vamp Weight Watchers. Watchers. Ha."

"I don't need Vamp Weight Watchers. And, Giles, he won't stop bitching about Willow. Willow this, Willow that. Giles!" Buffy finally yelled since Giles was staring at the same spot as before.

Buffy snapped her fingers in front of his face.

"I failed her," he said in a gravelly, tragic voice that made Buffy want to puke.

"Who? Willow?" Buffy guessed.

"Buffy."

"I'm Buffy!" Buffy objected.

"Put an 'out of order' sign around his neck, Buff, because his elevator is not going to the penthouse floor," Xander told her.

"I guess you are just a sucky watcher, Giles." Buffy said as she got up, exasperated. She tipped over her chair and didn't bother picking it up. That would show him.

"Should we kill him? Should we turn him?" Xander asked hating to leave behind an uneaten meal.

"He's depressing," Buffy pouted.

Giles didn't so much as raise a hand to cast his vote. He sat there like some big lump, as if a conversation about his death had nothing to do with him. Maybe he was too polite to interrupt, or even to eavesdrop.

"So kill him?" Xander asked with a shrug.

Buffy turned to make a face at Xander.

"And when we need to know stuff, we'll look it up ourselves?" Buffy asked.

"Oh, God, no. I'm done with researching. Vampirehood has its privileges, and not having to do research, or anything else resembling homework, is one of them."

"Let's go ransack Snyder's office. I want to see my permanent record then I want to make him eat it," Buffy decided. She stepped over the overturned chair.

"Then we eat him. And his secretary. And the guidance counselor." Xander smacked his lips.

"Nighttime," Buffy said, pointing up. Both she and Xander looked at the high, library windows. They both sighed.

"They stop scheduling school events after sunset just because some students and parents and teachers got eaten. Wimps," Xander said with scorn and disappointment.

"Snyder would be all stringy anyway."

"Bet he'd taste like an old gym shoe," Xander agreed as they walked out of the library ignoring Giles where he sat determinedly not looking after them.

Buffy and Xander tore apart Snyder's office to let off some steam. They left the school still hungry and no better informed.

  


From far enough away so they couldn't sense him, Oz watched them step out through the school's double doors. He looked up at the sky. The incomplete moon looked down at him like a winking eye. He walked away.

  
  


To be continued


	14. Schemes

Bad Company: Schemes

  
  


Buffy felt like she was going to puke. The flu was hitting her hard. Or was that Angelus. When his next punch landed, he became blurry around the edges. His voice was fading in and out. Buffy was close to fainting when she felt his teeth. Her lungs constricted. Each breath came shorter. The darkness behind her eyes was so black now. Her breathing stopped. Her heartbeat stopped. The only sound was Angelus drinking.

  


Buffy stood still just inside the dark alleyway. The street was bright with signs and streetlights. A movie was letting out. People passed, talking. She heard so many things - their voices, their feet, the contents of their purses and pockets clinking. None of the sounds came from Buffy. If she heard a heartbeat, it wasn't hers. The breathing wasn't hers. She gave off no signs of life until she moved. And she moved unnaturally fast. She grabbed a young guy who walked only a step or two behind a group of his friends. She pulled him into the alley and no one saw. She drained him and dropped him to the ground before anyone turned to see where he had gone. She disappeared before anyone thought to call his name.

  


Xander looked up at the house. He didn't know which window was hers. Some windows were dark. The kitchen was bright. The living room was dim and flickering from the TV. Amy was somewhere safely inside. Her Dad wasn't. He was sleepily taking out the trash in his pajamas. Xander grabbed him by the neck and slammed him into a tree.

"Oh, Amy!" Xander called out while Amy's father hung limply from his grip.

Amy cautiously appeared at an upstairs window, a curtain draped over her shoulder. The room behind her stayed dark.

"Xander Harris?" she asked. She had trouble seeing him. "Don't even try... what are you doing?"

Xander still had her father by the neck, and Amy finally spotted him.

"Dad!"

"He's still alive! But he won't be if you don't come down here."

She stood still, and her window stayed dark.

"Amy, you might want to get down here before my fangs slip or something."

She was gone and at her front door within seconds. Still inside the threshold, she was mumbling something under her breath

"Amy, you can't chant as fast as I can snap his neck," Xander warned her.

She stopped.

"Come on. It's me, good, old Xander. Give me a break."

"What kind of a break?" Amy asked, ready to make a deal.

"Yes, that's right I am once again in need of your services."

"And I'll get my father back."

"Sure. I don't need him. Plenty of fish in the sea. I am all about catch and release. I can always catch him again if you welch."

"Another love spell?" she guessed.

"The other one was such a success at getting me almost killed, hmm..." Xander pretended to think. "No, I don't want to get almost killed again. I want to get someone unkilled."

"You are kidding."

"What? Is that hard, bringing people back from the dead?"

"Oh, no. But I'm going to need a few ingredients. I'm all out of bringing people back from the dead powder." She sounded snippy. Xander felt she needed more motivation.

"I know. You can practice on your Dad. I'll crack his skull and you can..."

"No. I'll do it!" she relented seeing as her father was still in Xander's lazy grip. "But I really do need some stuff."

"Sure."

"And that means money."

"Money?"

"You think resurrection is cheap. The stuff I am going to need costs serious..."

"OK, OK." Xander interrupted her. "Am I going to have to rob a bank?"

"No. A few convenience stores maybe."

  


Buffy was full of blood and ideas when she met up with Xander.

"Let's go clothes shopping." Buffy told Xander. It was part one of her plan. He hated it already.

"Ooh, baby. Just the words every guy wants to hear." Xander used a sarcastically amorous voice. He was testy because he had hurriedly killed a girl who reminded him of Willow. She hadn't looked like Willow until he killed her. Then her skin turned pale, her eyes went wide, and they just wouldn't close.

Xander was obviously preoccupied. Buffy didn't notice because she was preoccupied too. She physically dragged him to the mall just as it was closing. The last shoppers hurried out as the doors were locked. The security guard, who tried to escort Buffy and Xander off the premises, was soon slumped behind a trash can. Only a handful of employees were still in the stores. Then no one was left alive in the entire mall. The lights were dim. The fountain splashed quietly, the air-conditioning hummed, the escalator went up and down. Buffy took a second to bask in the glory of having a whole mall to herself. She breathed in the sweet smell of retail. But only for a second. There was no time to waste. She drew up a game plan like a shopping pro that she was. She knew that Xander, being a straight guy, would only slow her down so she told him to meet her at the exit by the shoe store.

"Right before sunrise, Buff? Aren't you cutting it close?" he complained.

"I haven't been shopping for a week. I'll be lucky if I make it out of here alive."

"I'm going to have to come in and pry your cold, dead hands off a mountain of designer handbags, aren't I."

"Think about it, I'm not restrained by my mom's credit limit. I may never leave."

Buffy threats and the shopping zombie look in her eyes worried Xander. For Buffy, killing a guy took seconds, killing a bunch of guys might take minutes, but plucking some clothes from hangers was going to get them stuck at the mall forever. Buffy waved Xander off and told him to pick up something nice for himself. Xander was done in ten minutes. It wasn't like he had to wait at the register. The register was open and empty. The checkout lady was dead. While Buffy was lost deep in the clothes racks, Xander decided to visit some other stores and empty their cash registers.

  
  


To be continued


	15. Confinement

Bad Company: Confinement

  
  


Classes were about to start. The air was filled with the indistinct, echoing voice of a crowd. Giles walked the school corridors. His eyes automatically searched for them, not because he had forgotten, but because it was a habit he couldn't yet break. He saw only Cordelia. She was delivering a cutting remark to a short girl. He could tell by the girl's expression that the remark hit its mark. Cordelia caught sight of him, and her face turned quizzical. Giles continued to look through the students. So many, all the wrong ones, milling, fidgeting. He was looking for someone standing still. He saw him.

"Oz, a word," Giles said.

He put an arm on Oz's shoulder as if to lead him away. Oz didn't move. Then Oz slumped and Giles easily maneuvered him into an empty classroom. After lowering Oz to a spot in the corner, Giles locked the door. Gently, he removed the dart from Oz's shoulder. He sat down next to him to wait for the corridors to empty. Anyone peering in through the glass in the door wouldn't see them where they sat companionably.

Classes started and the halls cleared. Giles slung one of Oz's arms over his shoulder and carried him out.

The hallway doors were suddenly flung open. Giles stopped. A student, late to class, running a comb through her hair, froze once she saw them.

"Keep combing, honey," Cordelia said to her from behind Giles. "And there's this amazing, new product. It's called conditioner. You might want to look into it."

The girl scampered off, duly chastened.

"I can't believe he came to school drunk!" Cordelia said while the girl was still within earshot.

"Yes, it is rather unfortunate!" Giles agreed, also at high volume.

Once the girl was gone, Cordelia took up Oz's other arm.

"Did you drug him?"

Giles did not confirm the obvious.

"You are just dying to get fired. Or arrested," Cordelia scolded. Giles was unresponsive. He tensely watched for other late students, school officials, or janitors.

"To the book cage? Or are we putting him in the trunk of your car?" Cordelia asked.

To answer her question, Giles opened the door leading to the basement. They dragging Oz down dark passageways filled with Cordelia's incessant complaining. Oz was deposited into a room Giles had prepared. A light bulb hung from wires that came down through a crack in the ceiling. Cordelia saw that there was a cot and other things a prisoner might need, including a nice strong lock on the door. Giles manacled Oz's wrist to a chain on the wall.

Cordelia looked around at the years of grime and tried not to think about what might be crawling around, unseen. Giles just stared at Oz.

"And to think I was worried that you were losing it. Drugging students. Locking them in basements. You are in top form, Giles."

Giles couldn't tell if she was being sarcastic. It could have been genuine approval.

"When he wakes up, he's going to start yelling. You know , 'help, help, let me out of here, I've been kidnapped by a crazy librarian'. That kind of thing."

"Who will hear him?" Giles asked, glumly. He was arranging the chains so Oz would be more comfortable.

"Yeah, good point. Anyone in Sunnydale who would go to investigate a noise in the basement has to be dead by now, right?"

"You should go back to class."

Cordelia saw no reason to hang around. She noticed that Giles wasn't leaving. He pulled up a chair facing the cot where Oz lay unconscious. If you ignored the chains, Oz could have been sleeping. But the way Giles was sitting there, back straight, stern profile to the door, it was more like waiting for someone to wake up from a coma. Cordelia left knowing they would stay like that maybe for hours. She tried not to see them, but the bare light bulb burned into her retinas, and she saw the scene even when she closed her eyes.

  


Oz looked very slight on the cot. Giles resisted an impulse to unlock his chains and tried not to think of why he had the impulse in the first place. Because he wanted Oz to do his dirty work? Certainly not. 'Be a tidy boy. Clean up your own mess, Giles.' This imprisoned boy was not a solution to, but a consequence of his failure. When one drastic action was required he held off. How many more would he be forced to undertake because of that? Swallow a spider to catch the fly. If only he hadn't swallowed the fly.

The cool, dank air, the artificial light, the smell of decay, the deceptive appearance of sleep. He looked peaceful, but he would awaken. She looked peaceful, but she would awaken. They overlapped. Her white sheet covered Oz.

To Giles, the only sign that time had passed was Oz waking up. Lost time again. How long had he stood in the morgue with a stake in his hand? Minutes or hours? Or however long it took for him to be interrupted.

Oz didn't move. He glanced around the room, took in his situation, the chains, the door, and all the reasons for them.

"Are you protecting me or her?"

Ah, Oz, never one to beat around the bush.

  
  


To be continued


	16. Frequently Asked Questions

Chapter 16: Frequently Asked Questions

-

Ahh, the unlife of crime. The lights glared their welcome. The Slurpee machine hummed. The hot dogs turned and sweated.

"You want to clean out the cash register for me?" Xander asked casually. Leaning an elbow on the counter, he waited for his yellow eyes and toothy smile to make an impression on the convenience store clerk.

The cash register drawer slammed open with the crash of loose change. The clerk worked blind, stuffing money into a plastic bag without taking his eyes off Xander. While the clerk fumbled for the small bills, Xander threw jerky and gum over his shoulder and scattered overpriced candy bars on the floor. He slipped a nudie magazine into his jacket pocket. He grabbed a newspaper and read about his and Buffy's crime spree. Stores were closing early, more cops were out patrolling, and there was a reward for any information. Xander wondered if he could collect on that. Amy's resurrection supplies were seriously pricey, and Xander found more and more registers had been emptied well before sunset. The clerk handed over the bag with money. Xander sighed at the disappointing take. He would have to squeeze in another place before he had to meet Buffy.

"What else is still open around here?" he asked the guy.

-

Sneaking in before closing, killing a security guard or the lady taking inventory was now a nightly routine for Buffy. Not having to pay was nice. Shopping alone was less than ideal, especially since mirrors were no help. All those wonderful, full length, three way mirrors going to waste. Sometimes she smashed them. She had never missed Willow more. Xander did not make a good girlfriend even when he was around. Most nights he disappeared on her. He just didn't have the stamina. Buffy needed quality time in a store, and the makeup counter, and the hair salon. The salon was the real challenge. She was sitting in a chair in a hair salon where she couldn't even get an appointment when she was alive. The mirror in front of her was in pieces - she got tired of watching the hairstylist hovering over an empty chair.

"Willow, Willow, Willow, why did I have to kill you?" she sighed under her breath.

For some reason the hairstylist's hands were shaking. Buffy had to pinky swear that she wasn't going to kill him before she lost an ear to his hand tremor. He, in turn, swore that she looked divine. Of course he did this as he backed up, and rushed into the back of the hair salon, probably to throw up.

As she walked, Buffy peered into empty mirrors and darkened store windows and ground her teeth in frustration. That pinky swear wasn't going to hold if the guy made her look like a clown. She was wearing the best of her new clothes and testing out her look on people's faces. No one pointed and laughed or offered her money in exchange for sex. Men looked interested. Women looked envious. It was all good.

-

While sneaking off, Xander had filled up on a steady diet of convenience store customers, gas station attendants, and all night diner waitresses. The last waitress, who stood between him and a cash register, had Cordy's long, dark hair. That and the nudie magazine reminded Xander of the sex he wasn't having and had never had. Now Buffy's hotness reminded him of the same thing. They were walking, but Buffy wasn't telling him where they were going. Though she seemed distracted, Xander thought he should keep up some chatter before she noticed he had been up to something.

"You look like a total babe, Buff. Which gets me thinking. I'm a virgin vampire, a vampire virgin."

"So?" Buffy was gratified to have her hotness confirmed, but she wasn't crazy about the segue it inspired.

"You are hot. I'm horny. You have a responsibility here. Devirginify me!" Xander stopped as if he expected the deed to take place on the spot, right between the optometrist and the Lamps and More Store all lit up with lamps. The lamplight shone off Buffy's newly styled hair. She didn't pause. Her answer came easily from long practice.

"I just don't think of you that way. And it would ruin our friendship."

"Are you just running down the list of my least favorite lines?" Xander asked as he caught up with her. Then he had an idea.

"Buffy, let's do the deed for dead boy."

"What? Who? Angel?" Buffy actually looked around as if she expected Angel to pop out from behind a bush or something.

"Think of how pissed dead boy will be. What do you say?" Xander pressed on. Still, Buffy didn't throw him to the ground and make sweet love to him. She walked on with a purpose, leading them into a quieter, darker part of town.

"You're dead boy now, too, you know," Buffy pointed out.

"No. I need a whole new name," Xander said as he got sidetracked. "How about X?" Xander could picture it writ large, on a marquee, or a billboard maybe.

"Ex. Ex what?" Buffy asked. She may have been playing dumb, it was hard to tell.

"Just X. A big fat X." Xander crossed his arms in the air in front of him to show her.

"Big Fat X? You want to be knows as Big Fat X? Are you sure? That's more of a rapper name."

Xander threw up his hands and gave up. Xander would be fine. It had a certain grandeur. At least it wasn't a girly name like Angel.

"Speaking of Angel. I think he can help us," Buffy said.

"I don't want his help," Xander said, still thinking of his virginity problem, and he definitely didn't want Angel anywhere near that area.

"Giles was a bust. And I've decided that Angel is our next stop." Buffy pointed to the mansion. They were headed straight for it.

"That's where we are going? That's why you wanted to go shopping!" Xander accused. He looked Buffy up and down again, this timer without approval.

Buffy didn't bother to deny it. Actually, Xander was glad he wasn't wearing his old clothes. He was wearing clothes he couldn't afford. Clothes to kill for. Clothes he killed for. But that didn't mean he wanted to go see Angel.

"Not dead boy. Why him?" Xander grumbled.

"He owes me. This is his handiwork." Buffy pointed to the scar on her neck. Xander had noticed it before. It wasn't pretty, but he wasn't stupid enough to say so.

"Angel?" Xander shook his head in dismay.

"Who did you think did it? Some shmo?" Buffy asked as they pushed through an overgrown garden.

"You let Angel turn you?" Xander was struggling with the idea and getting slapped in the face by the branches Buffy was letting go.

"I did not! I had the flu." Buffy was really letting the branches fly now.

"You're calling in sick on this? What kind of a sorry slayer are you?" Xander was picking leaves out of his teeth.

"Hey, I am your sire. Show some respect."

"Pft," was Xander's retort.

They were on the mansion doorstep. A minion barred their way. His snarling face met with Buffy's forearm. He was dripping blood down his shirtfront as Buffy and Xander kicked in the mammoth door in unison.

"I'm your sire, Mister," Buffy told Xander as they walked in. "That means I'm your boss or something. Right?" she asked turning to Angel.

Angel looked bewildered at their sudden entrance but recovered quickly. He said "sure" to answer Buffy's question. Spike turned his wheelchair around and scoffed at Angel's nonchalant answer.

"So why aren't you a minion of the big, lumpy one?" Xander asked Buffy as he pointed to Angel.

There was an explosive guffaw from Spike. "Boy's got a way with words."

"That's a very good question," Angel said, ignoring Spike in favor of Buffy. He spared Xander a warning glance. "And don't call me lumpy." His voice was so threatening, Xander would have been shaking in his shoes if he wasn't a vampire now too and kind of scary himself. Buffy was looking pretty scary also as she glared at Angel.

"You want an answer? For starters..." Buffy angled her head to show Angel her neck. "See this? Can you say unsightly?" She pushed Xander's head to the side to show off his bite mark.

"See that? It has proportion, minimal ridging, no gaping, or tearing. A little makeup and that thing is gone. I'd need to spackle over this thing on my neck. What are you, a wild animal?" Her eyes were throwing hate daggers at Angel.

"You do nice work," Spike said as Buffy looked at him as if to ask 'are you still here?'

"I don't wear makeup," Xander stated for the record.

As Buffy and Angel stared each other down, Xander checked out the place. He didn't see a TV to match the size of the room, or any TV at all. Maybe there was a stereo system somewhere out of sight, but there was no sign of speakers, and you would have to have major speakers in a place like this. On second look, there was no electricity. The candles weren't there to set the mood. This place was so Angel - gloomy, shadowy, oversized, and old. How does a guy live without video games?

"Dude, you might as well live in a coffin," Xander said.

"Yeah, you need to redecorate. Think curtains not cobwebs," Buffy agreed. She plopped down on a chair, then coughed at the dust.

"You didn't bank on getting so much lip, did you?" Spike was taunting Angel. A guy stuck in a wheelchair, with no video games, stereo, or TV, has to pass his time somehow. "You should have driven her bonkers first, like you did Dru here." Drusilla had just entered, or more like wafted into the room.

"The children are here," she exclaimed like a welcoming aunt.

Buffy ignored Auntie Dru's blather and went right to the point.

"Drusilla, that hairdo is kind of elaborate. Who does your hair?"

"Are you still shopping for an undead hairdresser?" Xander asked.

"Yes! Living ones are jittery. I want my bangs trimmed not my eyelids."

Dru wasn't recommending a hairdresser, she was trying to look at her own hair. It was a little like a dog chasing his own tail. Angel looked incriminatingly from Drusilla's hair to Spike. Spike got a guilty look on his face. Then everyone looked at Spike.

"Minions! Minions do her hair," Spike insisted, vehemently

Angel smirked.

"Do you do highlights?" Buffy asked Spike, who tried to look innocent of any hairdressing.

"Sure he does. Look at him. That hair doesn't bleach itself," Angel tattled.

"Yes, yes it does!" Spike claimed.

"And the nails don't paint themselves either, I bet," Xander said delighted by the image of Spike buffing Buffy's nails.

"They do. Yes, they do," Spike insisted as he folded his arms to hide his manicure.

"There's your hairdresser and your manicurist. Already preturned for your convenience," Xander said, glad that that issue was settled. No one asked for Spike's agreement. Then they got down to business. The questioning went on for hours. Angel was looking more haggard all the time as Buffy asked about dieting and moisturizing and Xander asked about sex. Spike was very informative on the subject, even eager to help.

"Vampires bite each other while having sex? Do you hear this?" Buffy asked, hitting Xander on the arm.

"Isn't that like chewing on a drumstick while you're doing it?" Xander asked.

"It is. Exactly," Spike answered, nodding at the aptness of the comparison. "So what's the problem?"

"No problem. I just wanted to make sure I was clear on the concept."

Unlike Xander, Buffy wasn't licking her chops at the prospect.

"Xander, are you trying to make doubly sure you never get any? It's like making love to a roasted chicken."

"Right. Ick. Bleh," Xander agreed, hurriedly, seeing that getting enthusiastic about this new sexual practice was a sure way to get to practice nothing. Angel was looking at Buffy like he wanted to make a meal out of her, again.

"Men! I suppose if you could also watch sports, or a Star Trek marathon, at the same time," she said as she gestured at Xander, "while you use my head as a beer coaster, that would be a perfect night of lovemaking."

"No, not at all," Xander lied. "I like champagne and candles and flowers and um, oh, romantic music, and umm, a fireplace, and silk sheets and... Am I forgetting anything?"

"Just your balls, mate," Spike told him

"And that you don't have a chance in Hell, you pathetic suck up," Angel said. He took a moment to smirk at Buffy proprietarily.

"So says a vamp who likes to eat while he f ... makes sweet love to a beautiful lady. And, I bet, chews with his mouth open while he's at it," Xander shot back.

"You'll never drink from that well," Angel sneered at him.

"I already did. Who's my sire? That's right."

"I am not a beverage dispenser!" Buffy yelled. She stood up and smoothed out her outfit as if to prove it. Angel still looked like he wanted to drink her.

"It's a special thing only between our own. It quenches our dark thirst like no other drink. It's not about convenience," Dru claimed dreamily.

There was a pause.

"Right. No. No, of course not," Angel and Spike chorused, unconvincingly. Drusilla frowned at them.

"Men," Xander said.

Buffy noticed the time. Angel issued an invitation, holding Buffy with his gaze like just that certain look from him was enough to hold her there. Xander Froze. Time lengthened. If Xander still breathed, he would have stopped.

-

To be continued


	17. Extra Credit

Chapter 17: Extra Credit

-

In the school basement the light was always on but it didn't cut the gloom. Earlier in the day there had been noises from above, the last trailing signs of activity as the school day ended. Now everyone was gone, and Giles couldn't tell day from night. But if he should lose track of time, Oz wouldn't fail to remind him. Putting the watch back in his pocket, Giles dragged his chair outside for the night.

He sat with the tranquilizer gun across his knees, staring at the locked door. There was an hour of quiet then Oz used his werewolf strength to try to break out. The metal clanged, the wall shook under the pounding. Dust thickened in the murky light. The vermin stayed away, their distant scuttling drowned out. Cordelia had come by to bring Giles fresh tea and left deafened by the barrage. Giles' ears had gone numb. His tea went cold in his hand. He was thinking about earlier that day when Oz was still himself.

-

Oz had been calm during daylight hours, nearly silent. Seemingly resigned to his situation, he was really just waiting. Giles said little to him. He was also waiting. Soon Oz would be nothing but a boy and no longer his responsibility.

"Tell me about Willow," Oz said, sounding far away. He was very pale and didn't eat much. Saving his appetite.

Giles tried to think if there was anything he could say that wouldn't make things worse. Or maybe nothing he said could make things worse. The silence lengthened, and Giles looked at Oz to see if he still expected an answer.

"Did they kill her together?"

Giles thought about what he knew about Willow's death.. One set of bite marks. Buffy's. He thought about what else he saw there, beside Willow dead on Buffy's grave. Were the fates of Buffy's friends set as soon as Buffy was turned? Could they have been saved? Locked away perhaps. Giles looked at Oz, chained to the wall. Safe.

"How strong is Buffy now?" Oz asked.

"I have no answers for you, Oz."

Cordelia had relieved Giles after classes. She was more cheerful company, if that was the right word. She brought magazines to read and shared with Oz fashion tips and the latest celebrity gossip. Oz reacted to this as well as he would have to any well meaning words from Giles. Giles left to try and get some rest, so he could come back to guard Oz during the night. He left Cordelia turning glossy pages and Oz impassive.

"Tell me about Willow," Oz said to Cordelia. She looked up from her magazine.

"Not on your life."

-

The mansion was disappearing behind them, covered by the wildly growing garden and heavy gates. Buffy could tell Xander was glad to be out of there by a spring in his step like a fire drill had just saved him from a pop quiz. Buffy was stuck, answering one last question. Angel? Maybe she was holding a grudge for the scar. Otherwise she liked being a vampire. Still, she wasn't exactly grateful to him. Maybe gratitude wasn't a vampire thing.

Oh, well, no loss could weigh her down now. Buffy felt lighter than she ever had when she was alive. Too bad vampires couldn't fly. She felt almost that light. Life sure was a burden. Being a vampire meant leaving behind a lot of baggage. The soul for one. That thing probably weighed a ton. Anyway, they were even. She freed Angel of his soul, he freed her of hers. They were a matched set now. Or they should have been. But his soul wasn't calling to her soul. Or if it was calling, she couldn't hear it.

The mansion couldn't be seen any more. Other big houses hid it from sight. They walked now where street lights lit their way. Signs of life were all around - sprinklers coming on, going off, bikes left in driveways, garbage by the curb. Then they were in the cemetery. Life and death so close together, each taking its turn, taking its share of Sunnydale. She and Xander now belonged to the shadow that Sunnydale cast in the night, the hidden Sunnydale. It was only a few steps away, right around the corner. Buffy and Xander knew the way. They walked it now with their steps light as air. The feeling was kind of like when you leave the house and you know you forgot something. Your pockets feel empty. But you can't remember what it was, so you can't go back for it. You just keep going.

-

Taking inventory, Xander had to admit, things were good. He left Angel's without getting staked or humiliated. And as a bonus, Angel got a little humiliated, though sadly, not staked. Buffy was sticking with him. Soon, Amy was going to deliver the goods. And Xander wasn't going to ask any questions. Not "How", not "Why", not "What happened back there with Angel?" He was Xander Harris, no extra credit questions for him.

-

To be continued


	18. Moving On

Bad Company

Chapter 18: Moving On

-

Though Buffy took forever to mull over Angel's invitation to stay over, move in, shack up, bring her blanky to the slumber party, she and Xander were out of there and walking through the cemetery on their way to a place to crash. Xander was relieved, but he felt like he was on shaky ground. This made him worry about his secret plans, but it also made his secret plans even more crucial. If Buffy ditched him... Afraid that he might look a little too thoughtful, Xander decided to act more like himself.

"Did you see that? Those guys had people chained to the walls like human Now and Laters."

Buffy took this as an invitation to vent. She paused for a second then resumed walking. Her stride lengthened, and Xander had to pick up speed.

"The label said refrigerate after opening. They were not lemon fresh. And you know if I want to eat someone who's smelly, confined, and past their expiration date, I'll go raid an old folk's home."

Xander nodded in agreement.

"It's like nailing a ham sandwich to your wall. Weird and eventually unsanitary."

"Those guys have issues." And yet Buffy did spend a few minutes, or was it hours, thinking about staying there. And now she seemed kind of grouchy.

"Should we look for something permanent like that?" Xander asked.

"Some abandoned haunted house with no cable? No, thank you."

"We can steal cable."

"That is so low."

"Yeah, we don't want to sink to...Is someone moving into the graveyard?" Xander asked her.

"Other than the recently embalmed?" Buffy followed Xander's eye.

"They don't usually bring all their stuff. Check out the moving van." In fact there was a moving van parked on the side of the street, just outside the graveyard. They could see a driver sleeping in the front seat, a map spread over his chest. They jumped the fence and approached the van. Buffy climbed on the running board and knocked on the partly rolled down window.

"You lost or something?" Buffy asked helpfully.

"No, officer, I was just resting my eyes," the driver mumbled, half awake, before he realized Buffy wasn't a cop.

"Hey! Were you sleeping one off?" Xander asked from the passenger side window. He could smell booze on the guy.

"What do you kids want? Get out of here." The driver rubbed his face all over. Xander heard the scrape of stubble against the rough palm of his hand.

So close to sunrise, Buffy didn't waste time making the guy walk a straight line. She pulled herself up through the window and bit into his neck.

"Don't guzzle him down. He's at least 50 proof," Xander warned her as he climbed in from the other side to get his share of the guy. He crushed the map of Sunnydale in his hand as he got a grip on him.

Even with his eyes closed as he drank, Xander could tell that it wasn't night any more. He and Buffy hastily dragged the dead driver into the bushes. Since the back of the van was the closest shelter, they settled themselves in with the furniture. The fake leather sofa was too far back, the mattress was turned the wrong way, so they each grabbed a recliner. The recliners were too cramped to recline and Xander's was a little stinky. The TV was dead. Xander rested his feet on it.

"Hope we don't get towed," Buffy said as she slung her legs over the arm rest.

"We're not illegally parked," Xander told her. "We are doing nothing wrong."

"Umm. Did you just say we're doing nothing wrong?" Buffy asked with a quirked eyebrow.

"So you think we can get towed for killing that guy?"

Buffy shrugged and curled up on her recliner. Xander sighed. What did they have to worry about? Getting arrested, getting a ticket, it was all the same to them. Now that they were vampires, a solution to any human problem was simple - kill. Still Xander worried, sleeping in moving vans wasn't going to keep Buffy out of Angel's clutches.

-

Long before sundown, Buffy and Xander were startled awake when they nearly fell out of their respective recliners. The van was moving.

"Oh my God, we are getting towed."

"Um, no. I think we're being stolen," Xander said after listening to the van's engine noise.

"Really,?" Buffy asked and looked around at the well used, topsy turvy furniture crammed around them. "Are they going to be disappointed. And then quickly eaten," she added with a hungry smile.

The van stopped and the engine noise died. Xander quickly untied some twine holding a pair of cabinet doors from flying open He tied one end of the twine to one of the van doors. The twine was too short. He looked around, shifting boxes, ripping them open. After a little searching, Buffy found some rope tying an old blanket protectively around a tacky painting. She undid that and handed the rope to Xander. He added it to the twine then helped Buffy look some more. Buffy ripped an electric cord off a lamp, and Xander found an extension cord. They tied them together and to the other van door. Then they hid, both from the inevitable flood of daylight when the doors opened, and from their pray.

The doors opened letting in an uncomfortable amount of midday sunshine. Two thieves squinted into the back of the van, their baseball caps outlined against the blinding sunlight. There was a sound of feet hitting the van floor.

"Look at this crap!"

There was a sound of spitting. Buffy and Xander waited until both guys were in.

"We can drive this load of junk straight to the dump."

There was the sound of another set of sneakers inside the van. The thieves stopped cursing and complaining when the van doors slammed shut behind them.

"Hey!"

They were blind, groping for a way out. Buffy and Xander spoke. Their voices sounded disembodied and too loud, too close. The only light came from their yellow eyes.

"Two of them, Buff."

"Goody," Buffy agreed,

"It's not that I mind sharing. It's that I don't like sharing."

"I'm with you."

There was a little bit of struggling, and the two thieves had some dumb questions like 'who are you' and 'what do you want'. Buffy and Xander cut them off. They finished eating without hurry and let them drop. Two bodies, drained of blood, slumped by the doors. Another human problem solved.

"That worked out nicely." Xander wiped his mouth and idly wondered if you could drink blood with a bendy straw.

"Who knows where these guys parked us. Now we will get towed," Buffy grumbled, back in her recliner, as she cozied up to a rolled up towel that at least smelled clean..

Xander shrugged. His stomach was happy, he was happy.

-

The moving van doors banged open, and their two victims fell out as Buffy and Xander emerged from their shelter for the night. No offense to the backs of moving vans infested with corpses, but it was a nice to be out of there. They cut through an empty parking lot next to a long closed car dealership on the way to a more promising hunting ground.

Sooner or later any walk through Sunnydale will end up at one of its many cemetery's. A dozen cemeteries, you just couldn't fight those odds. The cool night air was filled with the smell of fresh sod. Xander wondered how many of the graveyard's new occupants were their doing. No way to know. It wasn't like they took down the name of some girl they had for lunch. Speaking of juicy and delicious girls.

"Hello!" Xander said as Kendra popped up from behind a crypt.

"Hello, Xander." Kendra said. She smiled at Xander shyly. "Hello, Buffy."

"Kendra! O my God! Where did you come from?" Buffy tried to hug her

"I don't hug...vampires," Kendra said.

"So you know," Buffy concluded. She let her arms drop.

"It's my job to know," Kendra said.

"So serious and dedicated. I love this girl!" Xander said.

"I also don't hug boy vampires," Kendra told him. She did look down coyly as she said it.

"How about her?" Xander asked as another hotty stepped into view.

Buffy ignored Xander's chatter and the new girl on the scene.

"Kendra, did Giles call you? I knew he wanted to be your watcher! He couldn't wait ..."

"The Council sent me," Kendra assured her.

"Oh, OK. For me? Aww. That's so sweet. Who's the new girl?" Buffy asked finally giving her attention to the girl hanging back a step behind Kendra, halfway into a fighting stance.

"That's Faith. She's the other slayer."

"What?" Buffy did some math in her head. "Just because I died again? Sheesh, is there gonna be a new slayer every time I croak?"

"How many times you planning to croak, Buff," Xander asked.

"I think I'm done with that. It's so last week."

"Oh, come on, just one more time," Faith cajoled meanly.

"She's eager," Xander noticed and smiled. He found blood thirst irresistible, for some reason.

"Enough chit chat. When do I get to stab something?" Faith asked Kendra.

"It's stake not stab, learn the lingo, newbie." Buffy was appalled. They let anyone be a slayer these days.

"She's a full hand," Kendra sighed.

"Handful?" Xander deciphered.

"So are we fighting or what?" Faith asked, eyeing Buffy.

"I vote for 'or what'. 'Or what' is group sex, right?" Xander raised a hand to cast his vote.

"No. We need to report to our watcher," Kendra said, putting an end to everyone's idea of fun. She walked away without quite turning her back on the vampires. Faith went along unwillingly and cast an occasional 'make my day' glance at Buffy.

"Mmmm. Don't you just love them?" Xander asked as he watched them walk away with Faith looking over her shoulder while Xander looked at hers and Kendra's ass.

"Not as much as you do," Buffy told him.

"Am I wrong or does Faith look easy?" Xander asked once the slayers were out of earshot.

"She is trash," Buffy confirmed.

"So that's a yes. Woo hoo. Kendra looks hot. You think they're doing it? Kendra and Faith. Because in my head they're doing it."

"What two girls aren't doing it in your head?"

"True."

Xander smiled. He took Buffy's arm before she went the wrong way.

"Hey, Buff, let's go this way. I have something to show you."

-

To be continued


	19. Long Lost

Bad Company

Chapter 19: Long Lost

-

"Giles, wake up. Wake up! I didn't find any water to splash on your face, but I found this thermos of cold tea so that's what I'll be splashing on you if you don't wake up in 5 4 3 2 ..."

Giles blinked before the end of the countdown and tried to get up.

"Oh, good. I won't have to drown you in tea," Cordelia said. She set the thermos down and helped Giles up off the floor.

Giles looked around and found that he was outside the basement room where he had locked up Oz. The door was broken off its hinges. The lock still held up one side of it. The door creaked as it shifted, threatening to fall.

"Oz?"

"You lost Oz, Giles."

"I did not lose him as you can see from the state of that door."

"How did he break out? That's a steel door?" Cordelia wondered taking a closer look at the damage.

"He was relentless."

"I know. That's why I went home. Caged fury was making my ears ring."

"I think Willow's death affected him adversely," Giles said. Cordelia gaped at the epic understatement.

"You don't say? Did someone mention something about that to you recently? Hmm. Who was it? Oh, yes, it was me."

"And I listened hence this debacle of illegal imprisonment and property damage." Giles touched his head cautiously and grimaced.

"What now?"

"I find him."

"And then tickle him to death while he eviscerates you?"

"I must chain him up before he kills. Or gets himself killed," Giles declared with admirable determination. He stood up and wobbled. Cordy grabbed his elbow.

"Giles, you are in no shape to play dogcatcher."

"There is no one else." Giles looked around for the tranquilizer gun. Cordelia picked it up from where it lay empty. The darts had all missed. Oz had shoved Giles into a wall and gone after his pray.

-

With Cordelia's help, Giles limped to the library. He sat down to reload the tranquilizer gun.

"Mr. Giles."

Giles raised his head at the sound of the familiarly accented politeness.

"What's the artillery for?" Faith asked as she stood with Kendra in the doorway of Giles' office.

"Kendra, thank God," Giles said. He looked just as bad as he felt. Kendra gave him a look that was both stoic and a little pitying.

"Yeah, thank God." Cordy agreed. The concussed and armed librarian now at least had backup.

"Oz has disappeared," Giles told Kendra.

"Oz?" Kendra wondered "I was not..."

"Who's Oz?" Faith asked.

"Who're you?" Cordelia asked her.

"Who the Hell's asking?" Faith retorted.

"Faith, Cordelia. Cordelia, Faith - another slayer." Giles made quick introductions to forestall any more verbal fencing.

"Buffy is so full of it. The chosen One my ass," Cordelia scoffed at the slayer headcount which definitely exceeded one and also two. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Faith looking at her like she was stakeable. If it was up to Cordelia, that girl wouldn't be allowed to handle sharp objects. Or dress herself.

"First on our agenda is the werewolf problem," Giles said all business.

"Vampires, werewolves. So I'm stuck in a cheap horror flick," Faith decided. She didn't actually have a problem with that. More monsters equaled more things to kill. "Let's go hunting."

In fact, both slayers looked ready to go. Their outfits looked ready to go into a dumpster. Cordelia averted her eyes. Maybe all slayers were born with some kind of fashion impairment.

Giles was doing his mission briefing.

"The werewolf is a student here. Our mission is to find him and get him back to that cage, alive." Giles pointed to the book cage as he stepped out into the main floor of the library with the tranquilizer gun in hand.

"Not kill him?" Faith was a little shaky on the concept.

"Not kill him," Giles confirmed.

"At all?" Faith asked, not pleased.

"Not kill him in the least."

"I don't get it, is teen wolf your boy toy or something?" Faith asked Giles.

"Who? Giles? Giles never thinks about sex, he only thinks about books," Cordelia said.

"Your defense of me is most emasculating."

"No biggie."

The slayers headed out, one of them more eagerly than was decent. Reluctantly, Cordelia went along either to prop up Giles or call an ambulance. They walked out into another fine, monster filled, Sunnydale night, leaving the library doors swinging.

-

to be continued


	20. The Unundead

Bad Company

Chapter 20: The Un-undead

* * *

Since Xander seemed a little distracted, Buffy picked out a nice couple for them to eat. They followed them from a tiny Italian restaurant. The lovebirds went strolling through the park, passing in and out of shadows, foolishly oblivious. Their hands were obnoxiously in each other's back pockets. They deserved to die just for that. The pair had eaten pizza with garlic rolls for dinner. The garlic breath wasn't enough to save them though. Buffy and Xander stood in a pool of light, vamped out, and waited for the screaming. Instead of screaming, the girl started giggling hysterically until Xander took a big bite out of her tender, juicy neck. There's the screaming. It's a classic for a reason.

The guy kept saying, "Wait. Wait." The whole time he was backing up. As soon as he turned to run, Buffy was on him. Splat - the guy's face hit the dirt when Buffy landed on his back. For an entree he was a little tall. Buffy dragged him over to a park bench. She took a seat, laid him out over her crossed legs. She drank him daintily, like a lady. Then she stole the giggly girl's shoes. Bonus.

From the park, Buffy and Xander seemed to be walking around aimlessly. But really Xander was steering them toward Amy's house. It was his turn to take Buffy along on a secret errand. He decided to prepare her first.

"Buffy, I have something to tell you."

"You are gay?" Buffy guessed as she kept walking.

"No!"

"You are my father," was Buffy's next guess.

"Um, no. Do the math," Xander told her.

"Brother?" Buffy guessed again.

"Thank God, no."

"Cousin? Second cousin?"

"No. And also not second cousin once removed, third cousin twice removed, an alien, or a robot," Xander said to put an end to the guessing.

"I think that takes care of all possibilities."

"I went to Amy, you know, Amy, the witch," Xander confessed.

That stopped Buffy. She turned to Xander with a frown.

"Are you playing with magic stuff? You know how this will turn out. It's not another love spell, is it?" Buffy scolded and interrogated at the same time.

"Amy is going to bring Willow back," Xander summed up quickly.

"Zombie Willow? I don't know, Xander." Buffy was skeptical.

"Not zombie Willow, regular Willow. Then I'll turn her. And you keep you mitts off her before you accidentally break her, or set her head on fire, or boil her in acid, or something," Xander warned her.

"Like that's going to work. You'll turn yourself into a frog," Buffy said as they were walking again.

"An insatiably bloodthirsty vampire frog. I bet I'll be the first."

They were passing a playground on their way to Amy's house. Well lit, the playground was still eerie with all the empty, garishly cheerful, playground equipment. The swings, the motionless seesaws, and the merry-go-round hinted at something terrible lurking close, lying in wait for lost, unlucky children.

"Xander!" someone called out. Xander and Buffy turned. Amy, still far away on the other side of the sandbox, waved to them.

"This makes us even!" She winked out, leaving behind a few sparks to die out in mid air. Another figure stood where Amy had been.

"Willow? Willow! Wow!" Xander said as he and Buffy ran over to her.

"I've been having a strange night," Willow said. She looked dazed and stared at Xander with unfocused eyes.

"No kidding." Xander looked her up and down. She looked different. It almost seemed like she was wearing a corset. She also seemed strangely pale. Xander chose to ignore the inconsistencies.

"Look, Buffy, Willow is alive."

"I don't think so," Buffy disagreed. Willow didn't have that warm, tasty glow of the living. As if to confirm it, Willow hissed at Buffy, and her eyes flashed yellow. Startled, Xander stared from Willow to Buffy while the girls stared at each other.

"Will, why don't we let bygones be bygones," he proposed, not liking the vibe between the girls.

Willow ignored him and talked into Buffy's face.

"You've been turned."

"That's what I was going to say," Buffy told her. "Xander, what did you do?"

"I didn't turn her. I guess she came preturned at no extra charge," Xander said with a shrug. Turning Willow would have been nice. Maybe nice wasn't the right word. Fun? Memorable? Willow, already a vampire, was still focused on Buffy.

"You are friends with her?" Willow asked talking to Xander while glaring at Buffy..

"We are all friends." Xander wondered at her memory loss.

"You are not my Xander." Willow stepped back from him.

Stretching his arms out to her, giving her his best irresistible Xander face, he implored, "Sure I am. I brought you back to life. Well, Amy brought you back to life. I extorted you back to life."

"Life is nothing to me. I eat life for dinner." Willow turned away from them as if she was looking for something, maybe dinner. There was a brief gleam of her fangs in the lamplight.

"We all do. Why is she so weird? And why is she's so slutty?" Buffy asked, amazed and impressed by Willow's daring new look. Willow sniffed the air.

"This place doesn't smell of death. This is not my world," Willow concluded.

"That's right, I have dibs on it." Buffy shrugged at Xander.

"What's going on?" Xander asked.

"I don't think this is our Willow," Buffy told him, regretfully.

"But she looks like our Willow." Xander was still in denial. Buffy sighed.

"No, she doesn't," Buffy told him. She certainly didn't dress like their Willow. She also didn't sound like their Willow.

"In my world, the Master killed you," Willow gloated to Buffy.

"Well in my world, you are not a skanky ho. And I killed him and you," Buffy boasted right back.

"Why don't you dress like that?" Xander asked Buffy.

"Because I'm not a total ho bag."

"And why is that exactly?" Xander asked, feeling cheated.

"Where did she get that outfit anyway? Vamps, Sluts, and Beyond?"

Noticing Willow turn and walk away from them, Xander asked the more important question.

"Where is she going?"

Willow was heading for the other side of the playground. Angel, Drusilla, and Spike were waiting there, looking bored. Spike was not in his wheelchair. He was riding piggyback on a large minion, a head or two above Angel for once. They stood on the edge of the playground, and Willow went to join them.

"Puppy!" She said to Angel, delighted to see him.

"New nickname. I'll write it down," Spike said, also delighted.

"You're different, puppy," Willow noticed with a frown.

"It gets funnier every time she says it," Spike said gleefully.

"Little girl. I don't like being called 'puppy'," Angel growled.

"Do you like matches? I do," Willow cooed. Angel couldn't imagine anything more disturbing than this new and improved Willow with or without matches. But she had already turned away from him and was looking at Drusilla.

"Do you play?" Willow asked Dru.

"I like to play with little ones," Drusilla said.

"I like to play with big ones. We can play together," Willow proposed.

"Wow, that was dirty," Spike slurped.

The girls twined their arms together and skipped off between the see-saws.

"This could be nice, a playmate for Dru. Think she'll let me watch?" Spike needled Angel.

"Hope the little match girl doesn't keep Dru too busy to attend to you, after she's attended to me," Angel needled in return.

Angel went off after the girls. Spike followed on the back of the minion. "Mush doggie" he could be heard shouting as he dug his heels into the minion's sides.

"They stole her!" Xander said, stunned. "This is all your fault. You didn't make her feel welcome." Xander pointed an accusing finger at Buffy. She slapped it down.

"Oh, no. I'm not the one who brought the slut-pire over from the other side," Buffy defended herself.

"Let's kidnap her back," Xander set off after them until Buffy grabbed his sleeve.

"They didn't kidnap her. She likes them. She probably has her sights on Angel."

Xander pulled away from her in horror.

"She does not! My Willow wouldn't touch Angel with a ten foot pole."

"Well this is not your Willow, and this Willow would touch Angel all over, I bet."

"Keep talking like that and I'll barf all over your new shoes."

Having been warned, Buffy stepped out of barfing range. Then something furry and mad crashed on top of a parked car just beyond the playground. The car roof caved in. Buffy and Xander turned at the sound of a windshield smashing and the hood denting as the thing propelled itself in their direction.

"Ah-oh, I bet that's Oz," Xander guessed as he watched the werewolf hurtling toward them through the playground.

"I don't see a name tag. or a dog tag."

"How many werewolves do you know? More importantly, how many werewolves' girlfriends did you kill?"

As if to answer, Oz lunged at Buffy and she dodged to one side. Xander rolled off the other way.

"We're gonna get eaten by a lovesick werewolf," Buffy said as she and Xander circled the growling Oz.

"Not me, I didn't do anything," Xander claimed, lamely.

"Yeah, try explaining that to the ball of fur. He looks reasonable and ready to listen."

Xander tried a few quick moves and got Oz's attention. Oz 's claws ripped through the air next to Xander's ear and made a gash in Xander's arm.

"He is going to shred us," Xander protested as he ducked a swipe at his head.

"What if we get bitten?" Buffy worried as she kicked Oz in the side to get him off Xander.

Oz turned from Xander to Buffy. His jaws were snapping threateningly. Buffy couldn't get close to fight him unless she wanted to find out the answer to her question first hand.

"I wonder what happens if you turn a werewolf?" Xander asked climbed up the wrong side of a slide to keep away from Oz's claws.

"Let's not find out. I'm not Dr Frankenstein over here." Buffy jumped down one side of a seesaw. The other side went up, slammed Oz in the jaw and flipped him on his back.

"Frankenstein monster - that's who's missing. We get one of those and we have a full set," Xander realized as he jumped off the slide thinking he could kick Oz while he was dazed, but Oz recovered too fast.

"What, no Godzilla? No Mothra?" Buffy climbed up a tree

"That's a different set," Xander told her as he climbed after her

"Can werewolves climb trees?" Buffy wondered.

"They can knock them down."

Oz shoved at the tree nearly shaking them out of it. Branches rained down. The tree toppled. Buffy and Xander jumped to the ground. Oz didn't go for them though. He sniffed the air.

"He smells blood," Willow said, licking her fangs letting a little blood flow. Angel, Dru, Willow, and Spike on his minion had all come back, drawn by the commotion.

As Oz caught a whiff of Willow he abandoned Buffy and Xander.

"Doggy wants to play. Nice doggy," Willow cooed.

Her companions didn't look like they agreed. They fanned out and away from her as Oz came close. Oz was shaking his furry head. Buffy and Xander couldn't be sure, but he looked confused. Oz gave a mournful howl.

"Do you think he likes her new outfit?" Xander asked Buffy.

* * *

to be continued


	21. How Much Is That Doggy In The Window?

Bad Company

Chapter 21: How Much Is That Doggy In The Window?

* * *

Everyone stood still for a moment waiting for Oz to finish struggling with his Willow vs. VampWillow dilemma. With a teeth rattling growl, Oz resolved his Willow crisis and rushed her. Seeing the undersized werewolf going straight for her, Willow ripped down a nearby tree limb and tossed it at Oz, hard.

"Fetch, doggy."

Oz swiped the branch aside like it was nothing but a twig.

"Bad doggy," Willow scolded while quickly backing up.

Oz bared his teeth at her. Seeing that Willow was the target of a crazed werewolf, Angel and Spike on his minion gave her plenty of room. Angel drew Drusilla along with him despite her weak whimper of protest. Willow wasn't having any of that. As Oz lunged for her, she moved to hide behind Angel. Oz looked at Angel as a tall but inconsequential barrier and tried to shove him out of the way. Angel grabbed Oz's hairy arm and twisted it. It was nothing like twisting off a human arm. Angel could rip one of those right out of its socket with no trouble. Oz's arm gave only as long as the surprise lasted, then he started to twist against his grip. With the claws of his other arm, he went for Angel's face.

"Yes! Go for the face! Go for the face!" Spike cheered.

Angel grabbed Oz's other arm and saved his face from getting mauled. Oz made another go for Angel's face, this time with his teeth. Angel managed to dodge while not letting go of Oz's arms.

"Hey, Angelus. Having a spot of bother? Should I help? Need my help, old chum?" Spike mocked in a posh accent.

Angel was about to throw Oz to the ground and say something very cutting to Spike, when Oz sprang off Angel's chest using his feet. Angel landed in a sandbox. Oz, on all fours, went after Willow again.

"Do you know him?" Dru asked Willow. Willow was now using her to ineffectively hide behind. "He's lovesick, poor beast."

"So not rabies then," Spike concluded. Willow shifted her hiding spot to him but mostly his minion.

"Hey!" Spike tried to get out of the way as Willow circled him and his minion and Oz circled after her.

"Your little girlfriend brings trouble," Angel scolded Dru. He was still brushing sandbox sand off himself.

"Sorry, Daddy," Drusilla simpered.

"Ugh, pet. Mind my delicate stomach," Spike said. He nearly got knocked down when Oz pounced on Willow. Oz didn't see Angel stalk over to him. So it was a surprise when Angel grabbed two fistfuls of fur and swung Oz through the air past Spike on his minion and into a merry go round.

"Watch it, you bloody showoff," Spike complained.

Somehow Oz was already up, and propelling himself through the air and straight onto Angel's back. He tried to find a handhold in Angel's eye sockets. While keeping Oz's claws from gouging out his eyes, Angel had trouble shaking him off. There isn't much a werewolf can do to a vampire. Sure, he could poke his eyes out, he could rip his face off, he could tear him limb from limb. But none of these things will kill a vampire. And the size difference kept Angel's limb's pretty much where they were. What will kill a vampire is if a werewolf chews right through his neck, which is what Oz was attempting to do.

"A little help!" Angel demanded.

"I have every confidence that you'll shake him off eventually," Spike said, hoping it would be after significant disfigurement had occurred. Even disembowelment.

But Drusilla didn't want to see Angel's guts spilled all over the playground. Actually, she did want to see that. But she didn't want to see Angel disfigured.

"Poor Daddy. We must help him," Drusilla said to Willow.

"Must we?" Willow asked. Seeing the creepy and determined look Dru gave her, Willow shrugged and sighed. She and Drusilla teamed up. But with Oz stuck to Angel and both of them thrashing wildly, it wasn't easy. They finally managed to grab some fur and pull Oz off Angel. Angel was all scratched up and a little bitten around the neck and shoulders.

* * *

"Looks like you'll get to find out about that vampire into a werewolf question, Buff," Xander told Buffy in a whisper. They were both crouching behind the tree Oz had felled, watching the fun.

"So if next full moon Angel sprouts some fur... " Buffy thought about it for a second. "I don't think I want to see that."

"Oz is outnumbered. I don't think this is fair," Xander said. He always did have a soft spot for the little guy.

"He was outnumbered when he came after us too," Buffy reminded him.

"Oh that was fine. All's fur in love and war." Xander guffawed.

"Xander," Buffy said with deep sadness and disappointment while Xander tried to shrug away the disgraceful punning.

"Hey, check out who's out of the penalty box," Xander told Buffy. As he helpfully pointed, Faith and Kendra rushed onto the playground. Xander was definitely checking them out.

"I don't think this can get any better unless a pterodactyl flies onto the scene," Xander said.

"Ooh, a pterodactyl would be cool," Buffy agreed.

"Or a killer robot."

* * *

With two more players on the field even Spike and his minion had to mix it up.

"Giddy up, giddy up, horsey," Spike said as he kicked the minion's sides to urge him onward.

"I am getting spurs, I'll have you know," Spike warned the minion to make him move faster. But Spike had chosen this minion for bulk not agility. So the minion lumbered along until he got punched in the face by a dark haired girl who hit like a slayer. The minion wobbled, but he had a thick skull and managed to stay on his feet.

"Oy, mind the minion!" Spike told the girl. "Who the bloody hell is that?" Spike asked no one in particular as the girl had already turned to make Dru double over with a kick in the stomach.

"A slayer," said the slayer whom Spike had met on the unfortunate day that landed him in the wheelchair or, in this case, on the back of a minion. Kendra swung her leg out and knocked the minion off his feet and Spike off the minion. Spike landed on his ass.

"Pick me up! Pick me up!" Spike demanded. But just as his minion turned to do that, he was dust.

Drusilla was showing her teeth to the new slayer while the new slayer showed her the pointy end of her stake. Angel put an end to the show and stake with a hard backhand that knocked the slayer to the ground. She rolled away and picked up the stake she had dropped.

"My kingdom for a minion!" Spike yelled in frustration as Kendra moved on him.

Kendra leaned over him to finish him off. Instead, she got kicked in the ribs by Drusilla.

"Thanks, love."

"My darling," Dru said lovingly.

Facing Angel, the new slayer had a smile on her face and a little trickle of blood on her lip.

"That's fine, big guy. I'm not much for girl fights. All that scratching and hair pulling. I'd rather fight you any day." To punctuate her sentence, Faith got knocked to the ground with a kick to the head. Kendra drew Angel's attention with an attempted staking. Angel grabbed her arm and squeezed. Faith got to her feet and tried to break his knee cap with her heel. He let go of Kendra and got punched in the face by one slayer then the other. More than anything, Angel looked annoyed.

The werewolf kept Willow at bay. He snarled and swiped at her without connecting. Circled her, knocked her down then retreated. His attacks were half hearted, chaotic. He couldn't seem to make up his mind.

* * *

Buffy and Xander were no longer hiding as they watched the fight. Their eyes shifted over the playground like they were following a tennis match.

"Should we get in on that?" Xander wondered.

"Whose side are we on?" Buffy asked.

"Ours." And being on their side involved standing around and watching.

They noticed Giles and Cordelia first huddled by the swings then creeping under the monkey bars toward the fighting . Xander waved to them.

* * *

Cordelia frowned at his wave, then spotted Willow.

"Willow? What the Hell? I staked her. I staked her good."

"And repeatedly." Giles remembered it well as did his stomach.

"Why is she up and around, Giles?" Cordy asked accusingly.

Giles didn't bother to answer. He tried to get close to the fight without attracting attention..

"Giles, this is strictly a freakfest or a monster truck rally. How about we keep out of it? Like those two." She pointed to Xander and Buffy acting strictly as spectators.

* * *

"Look at them go. I love slayers," Xander said as Angel catapulted Faith right at his feet.

"Ow!" Xander added as his love for slayerkind was answered. Faith clipped him in the jaw while flipping herself up off the ground.

"Love hurts, babe," Faith said to him and ran off to help Kendra.

"You still love slayers?" Buffy asked him as he rubbed his jaw. Xander was too busy checking if his jaw was broken to answer.

* * *

Giles noticed that Willow had Oz's full attention. He got close with Cordelia following unwillingly. Giles raised his tranquilizer gun and fired two darts into Oz's back. At first Oz wheeled on him and roared.

"Oh God, we're dead," Cordy decided with very good reason. But soon Oz was swaying and Willow was clapping. Then she was smiling wolfishly and looking over Oz's prone body at Giles and Cordelia like they were two bunnies.

"Why did you knock him out? Why did you knock out the only thing standing between us and that?" Cordy asked as Willow's yellow eyes glowed.

"So he wouldn't get himself killed," Giles told her. He raised the tranquilizer gun at Willow.

"Now we are going to get killed! Thanks for getting us killed, Giles," Cordelia complained as Willow got closer. Giles fired and Willow pushed the gun aside. The shot missed.

Just as she reached for Giles, a hand yanked her back by her hair. It was the hand of Faith.

"Hey, girly, the fight is over here," she said into Willow's ear.

Cordelia watched Faith get backhanded in the face while Giles grabbed Oz's hairy ankles.

"Cordelia, grab his arms."

Cordelia looked down and noticed that Oz was moving a little.

"And get bitten? No thank you, I already have a monthly inconvenience."

"Cordelia, please."

"We are protecting a werewolf from vampires. Are we nuts?"

"It's Oz," Giles reminded her.

"I think you are nuts and I am just humoring you," Cordelia said as she took up Oz's arms. "Eww, he's all furry."

"Imagine that he is a fur coat and act accordingly."

"You want me to whip out my credit card or just shoplift him?"

"Just lift," Giles said through gritted teeth.

"The slayers should be doing the heavy lifting."

"They are busy," Giles said as he groaned with the effort. Oz the werewolf was considerably heavier than Oz the human.

Seeing that Giles and Cordelia had Oz, Kendra grabbed Drusilla's bony arm and swung her into Angel, landing them both in a sandbox. Forestalling a kick from Willow, Faith caught her leg and flipped her over on top of the Dru and Angel pile. They threw Spike on as well. While the vampires tried to disentangle themselves, the slayers took over from Giles and Cordelia and carried off Oz to applause from Buffy and Xander.

"Why are you applauding?" Angel growled once everyone climbed off of him. He was brushing sand and minion particles off his clothes.

"You guys put on a great show," Xander said. "I could see it again and again."

Angel looked gloomy and stalked off. Drusilla and Willow picked up Spike by his arms and pulled him along.

"Ladies, you are dragging my bloody legs," he protested.

"Let's get his legs and drag him the other way," Willow proposed. She was delighted with the image of Spike's being dragged face down in the dirt. Dru got a glint in her eye. Spike was almost sure that she wouldn't.

"Never mind ladies. Thanks for the lift," Spike told then as his legs bounced over the playground then over a curb and down the street.

* * *

to be continued


	22. Invitation To An Intervention

Bad Company

Ch 22: Invitation to an intervention

* * *

The mansion corridors echoed with the laughter of two voices. Twice as much screaming when they played with their food. Angel pretended to be amused and not irritated by the girls as they giggled and whispered together, called him Angel Daddy and generally acted like two spoiled, preadolescent brats. His only consolation was the abuse that Willow heaped on poor, helpless Spike while Drusilla made weak objections and pretended not to be enjoying herself.

Spike wheeled himself through the Mansion. He was cautious these days. Kept his chair well oiled - wouldn't want a silly squeak to give away his position. Willow was too easily bored and Dru too easily amused. Willow was the new shiny thing. Dru would tire of her. Soon, Spike hoped, before anyone decided that a vampire in a wheelchair would be even funnier doused in petrol and set on fire. Really, his only consolation was watching them drive Angel right up the wall.

Spike stopped at a corner. He wasn't the only thing on wheels in the Mansion tonight. Down the hall he could see minions, under the direction of Drusilla and Willow, wheeling in a big slab of rock.

Where had they been doing their shopping, Spike wondered. The girls could hardly contain their excitement at their new toy. They squealed in unison and skipped down the hall following the big rock.

"Like two bloody peas in a bloody pod," Spike mumbled as he followed in order to do some eavesdropping.

* * *

It was a routine night of stalk, kill, shoplift, repeat for Buffy and Xander. The streets were empty, everything was closed. It was late and there was nothing to do, no one to kill. As they passed an alleyway, Xander and Buffy sensed something lurking there, definitely demonic and of no interest to them. Or so Xander thought. They came across demons from time to time and usually watched them scurry away. Most demons were not eager to go meet and great the recently deceased slayer. Buffy often looked disappointed and occasionally had to be talked out of giving chase. Her predatory instinct was all out of wack. And here was proof of that. Buffy smiled and turned toward the alley. Something with horns and glowing eyes retreated further into the dark.

"Buffy, we can't eat that," Xander said.

"You can't still be hungry," Buffy told him over her shoulder as she entered the alley.

"I could eat, maybe a snack, a little something. But that thing is not little or edible." Xander said as he followed reluctantly.

"I bet he gives me a good fight. Look at those claws," Buffy said. There were claws gleaming in the thickening darkness. Words from some demonic language could be heard indistinctly.

"Buff, you need a hobby. Knitting, hang gliding, puzzles maybe. Is it getting darker in here?" Xander asked. Buffy waved her hand in front of her noticing that the night seemed extra dark around them. They couldn't see a thing so they listened. There was a scrape of metal and then a clank and then silence. Visibility returned to normal and Xander and Buffy found themselves alone in the alley.

"Damn it, where did he go?"

Xander pointed down.

"Sewer. I am not going down there," Buffy said. Though vampires and demons made regular use of the convenient and usually not sunlit sewer network, Buffy preferred not to scurry down stinky tunnels like a rat.

"Glad to hear it," said Xander who also didn't love the sewers, chasing down things he couldn't then eat, and slayer-like conduct unbecoming a vampire.

Buffy wasn't glad. Once they were back on the street, she kicked at a stop sign making it squeal and bend down to the ground. Xander pictured a nice pileup come morning rush hour. Buffy stomped away.

"God, I'm bored. This unlife has me almost missing high school," Buffy grumbled.

"Bite your tongue."

"What? You afraid the school board will start mandatory night school for vamps demons and the like?"

"Definitely bite your tongue."

Looking around for something else to kick, Buffy walked the streets. Xander pointed to a parked Lexus and Buffy kicked in its door, setting off the alarm. She ripped a pay phone out of its booth and threw it through the car's windshield.

"Now I know why demons and vampires and all those guys..." Buffy started to say once they were away from the noise.

Xander just had to interrupt her what with her recent almost slaying.

"You mean us guys?"

"Sure, but I mean, I get why they are always trying to destroy the world."

"And sometimes a luxury car, a pay phone, a stop sign, or whatever might be standing around. Because they are evil and now so are we?" Xander proposed.

"No. That's what I'm getting at. It's not because they're evil." Buffy pointed her finger for emphasis.

"We. We are evil," Xander corrected her. He also wondered if he would have to stage a slaying intervention and who he should invite.

"It's not because we are evil. It's because the world is boring. They're just trying to squeeze some fun out of it." She made a slow squeezing motion with her hand.

"I think squeezing the blood out of people is kind of fun."

"I mean the kind of fun that puts up a fight not some secretary trying to mace me."

"Hey, it stings." Xander was speaking from recent experience with an eyeful of mace. He nearly got kicked in the groin with a pointy shoe as well. Who needs more excitement than that? But taking down a feisty secretary wasn't enough for Buffy.

"I mean big fun. The kind of fun that makes you feel alive. And I mean 'alive'. Like you have something to lose. You know what I mean."

"Like when i tried to bring back Willow? And then Oz tried to eat us. And then Oz tried to eat Angel. That was fun. Especially the last one."

"Sure. I mean not the last one," Buffy corrected herself. Though now that she was evil she wasn't exactly filled with care and compassion for her fellow evil creatures, not even Angel. But she did miss Willow.

"I miss Willow," she said.

"Gave it my best shot," Xander said with a shrug.

"You got my hopes up. It would be so cool to have Willow with us all evil but still Willowy not like that skank Willow wannabe."

"I guess when it comes to Willow you can't go generic." Actually, Xander could see the advantages of the fake, sexy Willow. And in the absence of the real thing, he wasn't too proud to settle. He just wasn't telling Buffy that.

* * *

Buffy had calmed down a little and stretching out in front of the TV sounded like a perfectly good way to waste the pre-dawn hours. They headed toward their current place of residence. Well before they noticed the vampiric presence lurking in the shadows, Buffy and Xander smelled cigarette smoke. They decided to ignore the stench and walk on by when a familiar voice called to them.

"Oy, you two." Spike stepped out of the shadows and threw away a still burning cigarette.

"Look who's a walkie-talkie now," Buffy said on seeing Spike standing up and not so much as a set of crutches in sight.

"Check out the vampire healing powers at work. Nice." Xander found it heartening. Having noted Spike's new uprightness and having voiced their approval, Xander and Buffy started to walk away again.

Spike called them back.

"Hey! You two nitwits, I wasn't strolling about just to stretch my legs."

"He's being rude," Buffy observed to Xander.

"She still stakes people you know," Xander told Spike. Spike only looked exasperated and got to the point.

"Your good girl gone bad is going to end the world."

"You mean Willow? Our Willow?" Xander asked.

"She isn't our Willow. She is some undead copy Amy conjured up to get you off her back," Buffy said grumpily. It would have been cool to have the real Willow back.

"Whatever she is, Little Red is going to bloody end the world."

"See, Willow doesn't sit around she knows how to make fun happen," Xander said and Buffy had to agree.

"She is going to end this world." Spike pointed at the parts of the world that were in their immediate vicinity. The trash can that needed emptying and a crushed takeout container that didn't make it in. The parking meters, streetlights, pavement, shrubbery. Neither Xander nor Buffy showed much concern that any of these things would come to a dire end at Willow's hands.

"If you care so much, you could, I don't know, stop her," Xander said.

"What do I look like?"

"No, Xander, I want to tell him," Buffy said.

"We can take turns," Xander proposed.

"She's suctioncupped herself to my Dru. They are a bloody world destruction team now," Spike complained.

"Whipped," Xander said making Spike look from him to Buffy in a people in glass houses kind of way.

"Why are you bothering us? Round up Angel and go to town," Buffy told him dismissively.

Spike took a step toward Buffy, stood in the full glare of the streetlight. Buffy folded her arms.

"Angel's sitting on the fence. One the one hand world destruction sounds peachy and keen to the big headed ponce on the other..."

"...we live in this world and keep all our stuff here," Buffy finished for him.

"Exactly."

"Your boyfriend is a dope, Xander told her.

"They'll probably screw it up. I think this Willow is kind of an airhead. And your girlfriend has a few hundred screws loose. You have to be super-competent to end the world properly. That's why it's still here. Look," Buffy gestured all around at the existence of the world trashcan, parking meters and all.

"Or you've just got to be lucky. Blondy, go talk to you boyfriend before he decides to join the team. I'll take care of Dru. And you, Tagalong, get that redheaded bimbo out of my bloody hair." The last was directed at Xander who was distracted by singed spots in Spike's aforementioned hair.

"What's with your hair?"

"Never mind that." And Spike trudged off into the night.

* * *

Buffy and Xander entered the house for rent that was their daylight hangout. The utilities were all hooked up, the place was fully furnished except for one bedroom which they used to store the corpses of passers by and one enthusiastic real estate lady. Since they ate the real estate lady, no more real estate ladies had shown up. The real estate offices in Sunnydale had a strict policy of not trying to evict the undead.

"Hey Buff, you want to destroy the world maybe? Could be fun," Xander asked.

"I don't think Hell has any comfy seating or decent hair products," Buffy said as she took a seat in the cushy living room couch.

"You are such a girl." Xander also made himself comfortable. "The next place we break into, has to have some video games hooked up. In the meantime, remind me to shoplift some."

"You are such a boy. And video games, another thing I bet they don't have in Hell."

"You don't know. Hell could be chock full of video games." Xander grabbed the remote and saw a note taped to the TV. The note was in Giles' handwriting.

"Why is Giles leaving us notes. I thought he doesn't like us," Buffy wondered. The note asked them to go to the library. "Do we have overdue books?"

"It's probably a trap." Xander said as he stretched out on the couch.

"Goody."

"No. Not goody."

Xander had never been a fan of the library or school so he was against going. He was also concerned about the probability of staking being twice as high these days.

"You do remember that there are two slayers in town?" he reminded Buffy.

"And? What are you saying, Xander? You saying I can't take them?"

Though Xander did his best to reassure Buffy that he had complete confidence in her and there was no need for her to prove it by getting him killed, they were off to the library as soon as the sun set.

* * *

Oz had been freshly released from his cage and Giles was assuring him that he hadn't left a wake of yummy human entrails during his rampage.

"But the fur could use some conditioning and a good brushing," Cordelia added helpfully. "It was not baby seal soft."

While Giles gaped at Cordy, Faith barged into the library and slammed a crossbow on the table. Kendra followed in after her with more decorum.

"So. When do we go bag Buffy?" Faith asked

"At the moment, Buffy is not a priority," Giles told her.

"Since when?"

"Since she isn't trying to destroy the world." Giles then told them about the tomb of Acathla being stolen from the museum by vampires. While Giles prattled, Kendra nodded like she understood what he was yacking about. Faith fondled her stake. Cordy tried not to space out and managed to catch the Hell on Earth gist of it.

"Vampire hobbies are weird," Cordy said. "Can't these two superfreaks just break down the door and confiscate the jack in the box before he pops out?"

"Even with two slayers, we are outmatched. If we mount an assault, they may complete the ritual before we can get through their defenses."

Cordelia shook her head in dismay at the cut rate slayers, but since they could break open a ribcage with a chair leg, she didn't say so.

"Maybe wolfboy can help," Faith said seeing Oz sitting there.

"He is just a boy now. An undersized boy. And those are a dime a dozen and not too useful. Sorry Oz. It's just the truth," Cordy said with a shrug.

Oz looked stricken, not at what Cordy was saying, but maybe for other reasons. Rather than chastise Cordelia for her excessive honesty, Giles drew Oz aside.

"I need to speak with you."

Oz looked down at Giles' hand ready to lead him away.

"Last time I heard that, I ended up chained in the basement."

"Please."

* * *

"He is so tiny," Kendra whispered to herself. Faith overheard.

"Sure. You can carry him in your purse like one of those ugly, little dogs."

"Don't say that. He might be sensitive."

"Hey, chinchilla boy," Faith called out interrupting whatever super-serious thing Giles was telling Oz. Faith pointed her thumb at Kendra. "This one likes you. She's repressed. You're a werewolf. Go to it."

Kendra was mortified. Oz gave her a sad smile. He turned back to Giles.

* * *

"I'm afraid you will not agree with my decision to call on Buffy," Giles said to Oz. "Saving the world..."

Oz walked out.

"Is our priority," Giles finished.

They had all heard Giles.

"I don't want to question your leadership, I'll go for broke and question your sanity," Cordelia said.

"Let me," Faith interjected. "Your little slayer bimbo is a vampire now. I say we declare open season on her scrawny ass and..."

"Sit down, Faith," Giles barked at her.

Faith gave him a defiant look and she didn't sit but she didn't say anything more about Buffy either. For the moment.

* * *

"Speak of the devil," Cordy said as Buffy and Xander walked in with the maximum suddenness. As the slayers held up their stakes, Giles motioned for them to hold their horses.

"You were talking about me? Saying nice things I'm sure," Buffy said to Cordy. Cordelia couldn't be bothered to say nice things about her while she was still alive and not eating people for breakfast lunch and dinner, there was no chance she was doing it now.

"I don't like to speak ill of the dead," Cordy said as she wisely left the vicinity of two vampires, two slayers and one crazy librarian.

"Nice invite Giles," Buffy said, waving the note. The note said, 'Your very existence is in danger, come to the library'. "Were they all out of RSVP cards?"

"Angel and his cohorts want to destroy the world," Giles said so as not to prolong the unpleasantness.

"Old news," Buffy said looking bored. Of course, Buffy often looked bored while Giles talked.

"They have acquired an artifact which will open a portal to Hell. Don't think for a moment that Hell on Earth is congenial to you current free cable and designer outfits lifestyle," Giles said harshly.

Buffy didn't bother denying that he had hit the mark with that. She did wonder how he knew exactly how she spent her time.

"We already decided we don't want to live in a Hell dimension, you know they won't have Slurpees," Xander said. "And I mean the regular and human varieties," he elaborated and that earned him a dirty look from pretty much everyone in the room.

"So the substitutes can't cut it? Kids throwing spitballs at your neck?" Buffy taunted the two slayers. Kendra fumed while Faith looked ready to launch herself at Buffy.

"You can get close to Angel unlike the rest of us," Giles explained while he glared at her.

"Sure boss. So should I just kill him or do I have to do anything special?" Buffy asked sarcastically. Either Giles missed the sarcasm or he didn't care because he answered seriously.

"You have to kill him before he opens the portal."

"But he was my first boyfriend," Buffy said in a whine that could peel paint off the walls.

"Suck it up," Faith told her.

"I can suck you up," Buffy warned her.

"I can watch," Xander said.

"Girls!" Giles hissed.

"Did he just call me a girl?" Xander asked.

"Excuse me, you undead wretch," Giles said to Xander, with extreme venom.

"Girl is fine." Xander drew away from Giles while asking himself why. As a vampire, what exactly did he have to fear from a stern, British librarian?

"If you are counting on her to do anything but start macking on the guy..." Faith told Giles.

"Hey, you are just a temp. Go make coffee," Buffy said.

Faith moved like she was going to fight and not make coffee.

"Acathla is our only consideration right now, Faith," Giles said to distract them from any fisticuffs.

"Isn't this just like the old days," Xander said.

"Not in the least," Giles disagreed.

"If Buffy fails there is a sword. We are waiting for it to be delivered," Kendra told them.

"Who gets the sword? Me? Me, me, me!" Buffy practically jumped up and down.

"Kendra will keep the sword," Giles said thinking that she was the only one of the bunch he could trust with a sharp object.

"You like her better than me," Buffy whined.

"Yes. I most definitely like her better," Giles confirmed.

* * *

Xander and Buffy left the library without getting staked or eating anyone. Xander wasn't complaining. But Buffy felt like she had been given homework on the last day of school.

"I'm retired. Why is everyone trying to give me my old job back?"

"You were too good at it, Buff. You should have slacked off then no one would be bugging you."

"Jobs are for losers," Buffy said.

Buffy looked thoughtful. Xander waited for her to spill it.

"I could do it you know. "

"Kill Angel. I'm all for it. Go Buffy," Xander cheered her on.

"No. Spike's plan. Divide and conquer. You saw how Angel was looking at me."

"No, I did not."

"Like he could slurp me up."

"He already did," Xander said with a grimace.

"He is just trying to impress me by ending the world. I need to set him straight. Think hideously expensive not hideous. Think designer. Ask yourself, would Buffy look good in that. Of course I would look good in anything even in Hell. But I can talk him out of wold destruction," Buffy said with confidence.

"Not if you ramble on like that. You know I've always been anti Angel so I vote kill him." Buffy didn't look up for that plan. "But if that's out, then Spike's plan it is. Great idea. I vote yes. Big thumbs up. And while you explain to big vamp-dummy why you don't saw off the branch you are sitting on, I'll go get Willow."

"This Willow? You just want her because she's slutty. I miss our Willow. I wish I hadn't killed her."

"Me too. Maybe Amy still has the receipt and we can exchange this Willow for the right Willow."

"Or at least get store credit."

* * *

to be continued


	23. Friendly Persuasion

Bad Company

Ch 23: Friendly Persuasion

* * *

A minor car accident on a deserted street got Buffy and Xander's attention. They heard the squealing of tires, denting of metal, and smelled a trickle of blood. They veered from their path to investigate, offer their assistance, see who smelled so delicious. Two young guys were already out of their crappy cars, arguing about whose fault it was. One accused the other of drinking and driving. The other one accused him of being a moron. The moron had cut his lower lip on the steering wheel. He made a big deal about it. Before the argument led to violence and needlessly spilled blood, Buffy and Xander stepped in. One reckless driver per vampire and argument settled. The cars were left to block the street. Buffy and Xander continued to the Mansion.

The Mansion stood imposing and unwelcoming as they approached.

"We're back!" Buffy said spookily as she stuck her head between the mansion doors. They had seen no minions on guard duty. No doubt, Spike's doing.

"Keep it down," Spike warned them as he wheeled out of the dark.

"You still got the wheelchair. That's just lazy," Buffy told him.

"I'm not letting anyone know I've gone vertical. So keep your trap shut about it," Spike whispered and looked around to make sure there was no one to hear Buffy's blabbing.

"Sneaky."

Buffy looked around. The place was mostly dark with an occasion glow of primitive lighting.

"Off you go. Angel's in the big room. Go put his head right. Snog him. Shag him. Do whatever," Spike told her as he led the way.

"Eww. No," Xander disagreed. "Use your words, Buffy. Shut up, Spike - like that. And if words don't work, smack him around a few hundred times. And don't rule out a staking."

Spike nodded in agreement. Buffy rolled her eyes.

* * *

Buffy went into the large, gloomy room. The big box of magic cement dominated the space. It certainly had all of Ange's attention. Staring at the inscription on the rock slab, he traced the strange letters to where they abruptly ended in a a jagged line of chipped stone. He knew she was there but didn't turn to look at her.

"Can you feel it, Buffy? One little ritual and Hell on Earth." He closed his eyes and pretended to breathe deep.

"This is not what I meant when I said to redecorate. Big slab of concrete - I am really starting to question your taste."

Angel looked at her, teeth clenched. She looked vacant and unimpressed. He turned his back on her again.

"Buffy I'm busy. Go play with something sharp."

Buffy did like playing with sharp things. She looked at the steak on her belt then at Angel and his rock. Everyone had their toys.

"Gonna make a lamp out of it?"

"I am going to make the end of the world out of it," Angel intoned importantly.

"This world? The one we are standing on?"

"I'm remodeling. Just wait to see it when it's done."

"That's what they all say and two months later you're still washing dishes in the bathroom sink." Buffy was having a kitchen remodeling flashback from way back when her parents were still together.

Angel looked at her like he was a demon and she was just some silly wannabe.

"I could end the world if I wanted to," Buffy claimed in response to his belittling look. Angel scoffed.

"Go shoplift something."

Buffy gasped at this very accurate assessment of the extent of her criminal ambitions.

"I am not jealous of a stupid rock!"

At that non sequitur, Angel raised his eyebrows.

"I mean... Oh shut up!"

* * *

Spike and Xander were skulking in the hallways, ignoring the suspicious minions they passed. They saw Willow further down the hall. Spike took the trouble to point her out.

"There's yours. Take her and go."

Willow was licking her fingers clean of blood. Xander held back, watching her, maybe sighing a little.

"Sure thing. Anything for you. What do you have against Willow, anyway?" Xander asked, in no rush as he watched Willow.

"I much preferred your little friend when she was a mousy little nonentity and she wasn't hogging my girlfriend," Spike confessed.

"I guess having you girlfriend hogged by Angel and Willow too..."

"Shut up and get her out of my hair. She's been throwing lit matches at it. This stuff's flammable you know." Spike pointed to his head which was marked with more singed spots than last time.

"It's not real hair, huh." Xander conclusion was based on the burned spots plus the otherwise perfectly molded and unmoving bleached blond mass.

"Of course it's bloody real." Spike pulled on his hair to prove it.

"It's glued down pretty good isn't it."

"I'll pull your hair for you Spikey," Willow said having noticed them. She slinked over.

"No thank you. You've done enough damage," Spike said as he wheeled away from her before she could pluck him like poultry.

"Hey, Will. Let's go have some fun, you and me. Let's get out of here," Xander said with a look that was part wolfish part puppy dog.

"And her?"

"Who her?"

"Oh her," Xander had to admit since Buffy could be heard shouting "If you love your stupid rock so much why don't you marry it?!". Then she could be seen stalking into the hallway.

"Bloody useless." Spike muttered.

"Are we going?!" Buffy snapped at Xander. He turned to Willow.

"Willow?"

"I like it here."

"Yes, world destruction central and the new home of the big stupid rock. It's lovely," Buffy griped.

Drusilla crawled out from the woodwork and went over to stand behind Willow. She circled her bony arms around Willow's cinched waist.

"Willow, about world destruction... " Xander started to say.

"We love destruction," answered Drusilla for both of them. She nuzzled Willow's neck.

"But if you're in it, you won't get to enjoy it."

"I think they are sharing the same brain," Buffy said as she walked away cutting her loses.

Xander opened his mouth for one last pitch but looking at Willow smiling, he didn't know what to say. He followed Buffy. Spike wheeled away slowly, a tight, frustrated grin on his face.

* * *

"Willow used to be smart. I think that corset is cutting off the blood flow to her head," Buffy grumbled as she walked away from the gloomy mansion.

Seeing Xander's spacey look, she had a pretty good guess what he was thinking.

"You are mentally removing her corset, aren't you?"

"Mmm, yes. This Willow has her advantages," Xander admitted.

"Yeah, she is the undress-up Willow. Brain sold separately."

"I'd say that didn't go so well."

"I think I might have accidentally convinced Angel to go ahead and just destroy the world already."

"Nice going."

"I am a creature of evil, sending me to save the world, what do you expect?"

* * *

Buffy was grouchy after the Angel intervention fiasco. She ranted for hours then staked some vampires to blow off steam. Xander kept his disapproval to himself. Stomping through the cemetery like in the old days, they got caught short by sunrise and had to spend the day in a crypt. Buffy was not happy about that. She was gone as soon as the sun set in search of a change of outfit and a hairstylist.

Just as hunger pangs got Xander to his feet, Faith kicked in the door and knocked him back onto the sarcophagus.

"I thought we had a truce, " Xander complained. He tried to slide away from her.

"And I decided to take advantage of our little truce."

As Faith started to climb on top of him, Xander decided that maybe he wasn't in such a bad position after all. She showed him her hands - empty. Xander was pretty sure she had a stake somewhere on her though.

"Want to search me?" Faith asked, seeing his eyes roaming her body. Xander did want to search her very much. But mainly he didn't want to be staked.

"What are you worried about?" Faith asked him.

"Stakes, crosses, holly water, garlic," he listed for her.

"Beheading, sunlight, ice caps melting, ozone layer depleting," Faith added. She was now straddling his crotch.

"Not so much the last two."

"A coward dies a thousand deaths," Faith told him as she leaned over him with her warm hands slipping under his t-shirt.

"And a vampire just two," Xander finished. He gasped a little when her hands slipped in the other direction under his belt.

"Don't you want to die happy, X-man?"

"Sounds good, except for the die part." Being called X-man did sound good. And the things Faith was doing felt good.

"I'll be gentle," Faith promised.

"You are the love hurts girl?" Xander was still skeptical.

"What's the prob'? Buffy taking care of your needs? Is that it?"

No, Buffy was not taking care of his needs. She wasn't even pretending to promise to one day maybe take care of his needs.

"OK, some ground rules. No staking, no crosses, no holly water, no garlic," Xander said.

"No problem." Faith pulled off his t-shirt.

"You got any rules?" Xander asked.

Faith took off her tank top.

"You do something I don't like, I stake you."

Though Xander ogled her, he didn't miss what she just said.

"No, no staking, remember?"

"Fine, I'll chop your head off." Faith shifted a little where she sat on top of Xander.

"Which head? No, never mind, either one is bad."

Xander watched Faith slither closer. Was this really happening? With a slayer. A slayer. Wait. Why was this happening?

"I'm a simple guy. Right now, I want sex. And as a bonus to make Buffy jealous. Why are you doing this?"

She shrugged.

"For kicks."

"And to make Buffy jealous," Xander said with a big smirk.

Faith didn't deny it.

"You don't mind if I picture you and Buffy together a little while we're doing it?" Sure it was greedy, but what the hell. He was on a roll.

"Whatever. But you scream out her name and it won't be the only screaming you'll be doing."

"No it's Faith Faith Faith Faith," he said to make sure he got it right.

There was a noise just outside the crypt, Xander ignored it. Soon the noise was closer and loud enough for Faith to hear. Faith was off him. She had her clothes back on in a flash. And just in time as two vampires barged into the crypt. Xander was ready to stake them himself. As soon as he zipped up.

"Check out these two," Faith said. "They're dying to put me in the mood."

"This is our place. You're trespassing. You know what we do with trespassers?" The bigger of the two vamps asked.

"You play pin the stake on the vampire?" She asked as she used her hold on the vault to spin a kick into the smaller vampire and stake the other one. The little vamp was out the crypt door before his friend's dust hit the floor. Faith was right behind him.

"When can we finish this? Hey!" Xander yelled after her.

* * *

Buffy, no longer looking like she spent a day in a crypt, came back to see if Xander was still lolling around in there. As she approached the crypt where she had left Xander sleeping, she saw Faith sprinting out the door.

Xander, hearing Buffy calling his name, went to hide and put away his nakedness.

Instead of Xander, Buffy discovered a pile of dust. A strangled cry left her throat. She was about to kneel down, maybe cry.

"Hey Buff," Xander said as he tucked his shirt in and made sure he was zipped up.

"Xander!" Buffy yelled then she hugged him. She was so happy she bounced up and down against him. Bonus!

"Who the hell is that?" Buffy asked referring to the ashes she was about to grieve over.

"Some vamp. Faith killed him."

"I thought that was you!" Buffy slapped Xander's arm.

"That doesn't even look like me. I am much more... Hey, you were upset. Aha! You were upset!" Xander did a little dance.

"Now I'm going to dust you myself."

"No you won't. You'd miss me. Can we have sex now?"

"We could have before the nya nya nya nya gloating," Buffy lied.

"Oh come on!"

"Sorry, the kindergarten level taunting and the little dance you did killed all the sexy ideas I was having," she sighed just to torment him.

"No glad you are alive sex? Or undead, unalive..."

"Glad you are still around to bug me. But sex doesn't come with that."

She looked Xander up and down, no scratches, no dents, no scuffs, no wear, no tear, no ring around the collar. His hair and clothes were a little disorderly, but otherwise he was in mint condition.

"Why didn't Faith stake you. Were you hiding?"

"I was not hiding. I was on full display, and she liked what she saw, and she wanted to sample my goods."

Buffy gasped.

"You slut. You cheap and easy vampire slut!"

"I played hard to get, I'll have you know."

"What kind of vampire are you?"

"Almost not the virgin kind."

"You tramp!"

"I am not a tramp. I just want someone to cut the price tag, remove the label. I'd just like to be broken in like a comfy pair of shoes. Or maybe something sexier than old shoes."

"Well you certainly stink!"

"I was saving myself for you, putting myself away for a rainy day, my interest was always growing, but you wouldn't make a withdrawal."

"Eww."

"Ok, I take that back. First an old shoe then a savings account metaphor - I'm not thinking straight?"

"What? Did all the blood go somewhere else?" She looked down.

"Tease."

"You risked your immortal unlife for sex!"

"You let Angel turn you!"

"I had the flu."

"I almost had the sex."

"Grow up."

"I was almost a man! Or a vamp-man who almost had wild, hot sex with a slayer. The wrong slayer but still."

Buffy took notice of what Xander just said.

"So you would still rather have sex with me?" she asked looking up at him with eyes glowing in the flickering lamplight.

"Any day." Xander couldn't turn away from those eyes.

"Well, forget it!" Buffy yelled and stalked out.

* * *

to be continued


	24. Neither A Lender Nor A Borrower Be

Bad Company

Ch 24: Neither A Lender Nor A Borrower Be

* * *

"Hello! I need to write a paper on how to end the world. Five pages. Single spaced. Due tomorrow!" Willow poked her head around a corner and peered down a corridor leading to the Sunnydale High School library. There was no answer, but Willow listened for other things. There were footsteps. Willow waited as they came closer.

Oz was making his way to the library. Option one: sit alone and brood, turn his back and wait for the rest of them to die, let the evil that swallowed Willow swallow the world. Not the way to go. Option two: do something stupid to get himself killed. In his state of grief, option two had potential. At least until the next full moon when his options would change.

Willow peeked at him from a doorway. Yellow-eyed and extra pale, she smiled.

"Doggy!" she called to him. Oz looked stricken as he stared at her. She looked delighted and vicious. This was a cunning ghost, the other side of the Willow coin. Looking at her, Oz felt he entered another world where he wasn't alive either. Even as she started to come closer, his dead self felt no alarm. No instinct for self preservation told him to move.

"It is not her," Kendra told him as she reached through the swinging doors and pulled him into the library. As Oz stumbled his way through the barricade, Kendra pushed them in place again to block the doors. Oz found himself face to face with principal Snyder. A sobering sight.

"Another one. I didn't know the school had so many dedicated students. Just can't bare to ..." Any other sarcastic things Snyder was going to say were cut off when Kendra shoved him behind some boxes. She did this because he was a civilian and not because he was annoying.

Giles was loading a crossbow in his office doorway. He looked up and started to say something to Oz. He raised the crossbow instead, aimed just past Oz's head. Before he could fire, something big slammed into him. Oz lost sight of him as Giles and his attacker fell behind the counter. Kendra grabbed Oz by the collar of his shirt and away from a vampire who had made his way through the barricaded doors. She was going to stash him somewhere safe, but she let go suddenly.

"Now, now, little one," Dru said appearing behind Kendra, close enough to touch her.

Kendra jumped away. She had Dru on one side of her and another vampire on the other. She felt goosebumps rise from Drusilla's near touch. Moving swiftly, Kendra lunged for the vampire on her right. Her stake missed his chest. She didn't expect to sink a stake into him that easily. When he dodged, he moved and now she didn't have to turn her back on Drusilla to fight him. Two vampires were grinning at Giles as he scrambled to his feet. He was trying to decide which one to shoot with the crossbow, allowing the other to reach him before he could reload. That left Oz for Willow.

"Can I keep him?" Willow asked Dru. "He turns into a real doggy."

Dru closed her eyes.

"Just seeing you is torture for him."

"Aww, why so sad, doggy?" Willow asked with mock concern, her head tilted to one side.

"Your every word cuts him." Drusilla smiled.

Kendra tried to make quick work of the vampire she was fighting, but he wasn't in a hurry to get staked. She kicked him away. Unwilling to watch Oz being tormented, Kendra attacked Drusilla. Trying to take advantage of her divided attention, Kendra's discarded vampire came from behind and opened wide for a big bite of her neck. Kendra flipped him over her shoulder and into Drusilla. For the moment, the two vampires were tangled. Kendra wanted to finished them but it was all arms and legs. Then one of those legs kicked her in the face.

Left alone with Oz, Willow reaches out her hand for him. She was singing "How much is that doggy in the window?" When she got to the part about his waggly tail, Oz grabs an ax and swung it at her. He was swinging to miss, and he did. Willow stepped back. Drusilla appeared next to her. Oz swung the ax at Dru, not to miss this time. He misses anyway. As the ax went past Dru's head, she shoved his arm into a wall.

"It's pitiful how he looks at me," Willow said smiling with no pity.

"I'll put out his eyes for you, dearie" Dru promised. She leaned close to Oz as he was pressed into the wall. Dazed, he was held there in a grip that was all bone, that didn't give an inch to his struggle.

"You long to die," Dru told him. She was very convincing.

Giles got one vampire with his crossbow. Now the empty crossbow was all that stood between him and the other one. The vampire grabbed the crossbow. Giles tried to keep hold of it, his desire to live against a vampire's strength. Then Giles let go. The crossbow came up too easily. The vampire slammed himself in the teeth with it.

Kendra slumped against a library table. Coming alive just as the vampire approached for the kill, she plunged the stake into him. You could say she faked and staked him. When his dust cleared, Kendra found Willow standing in her way. She tried to stake her too but was blocked and finally kicked away. Kendra sprawled over a table and caught sight of Oz in Drusilla's clutches. She rolled off the table shouldered Willow into a bookcase and charged Dru. Kendra spun around expecting Willow to come up behind her, but she wasn't there. The bookcase had come down. Willow and a shelf-full of books were spilled all over the floor. When Kendra turned back, Drusilla was in her face. Kendra saw only her eyes. Only her eyes existed. Kendra herself didn't exist. She had no muscle, no bone, no will, and no stake in her hand.

Willow pushed herself off the avalanche of books. Her encounter with the bookcase tipped it right over principal Snyder 's cowering place. Just before it would have crushed him, the bookcase hit the wall. Snyder should have been relieved. Instead, he was unconscious, knocked out by a large reference volume, but probably not dead.

Having had enough of this, Willow stalked over to Giles. She shoved the vampire who had failed to overpower a librarian out of her way. Motioning with her hand, she made another vampire appear out of the stacks. He towered above Willow. He nearly towered above the stacks. With his help, she easily dragged Giles toward an exit. Oz was ready to chase them, but Kendra had a more immediate problem. Dru was ready to slash her throat. Hypnotizes, Kendra just swayed as Drusilla prepared to strike.

Giles struggled against the large vampire who easily lifted Giles and carried him over his shoulder. Willow giggled. The large vampire chuckled in return and then fell on his face. The wiggling Giles had unbalanced him and the many books strewn over the floor had tripped him. Giles was thrown off him, unconscious and under the overturned bookshelf.

"Idiot! Go get him." Willow kicked her large vampire as he crawled over to retrieve Giles. Willow wasn't sure he actually felt her kicks. He was one of those oversized minions turned for the express purpose of giving Spike piggy-back rides. Willow took a moment to picture Angel giving Spike a piggy-back ride. Then the other way around. While she giggled to herself, the giant vampire reached under the bookshelf and pulled on a pair of legs then started to stuff the unconscious body, head first, into a big, black garbage bag. He then used more garbage bags to wrap up his kidnap victim.

"Garbage bags?" Willow couldn't get a look at what he was doing. His back was like a huge, muscly wall.

"I used to be a garbage man. I'm going to double bag him so he won't wiggle or spill. People use those cheap bags..."

"Are you brain damaged? Shut up! And don't suffocate him. Poke some holes. Idiot!"

While Willow signaled to Dru that it was time to go. The hefty vampire hoisted his burden over one shoulder. He picked his way between books more carefully this time.

Just as drusilla was about to finish up and go, Oz threw himself on Kendra and tackled her, breaking Drusilla's trance. Kendra stared up at him for about a million years as he straddled her. Faith and Cordy loomed over Oz's shoulder. Kendra scrambled up, unseating Oz. She looked around to find Drusilla gone, along with everyone else.

"Anyone left for me to kill?" Faith picked up the ax as she looked around at the mess.

"No," Oz told her.

"They got Mr. Giles," Kendra said just then remembering his abduction.

In frustration, Faith threw the ax into the library door making it swing.

"I am actually over here," Giles spoke up, clutching his head and climbing from under the bookcase.

"Then who?" Kendra wondered.

"Snyder," Oz said realizing just then why the garbage bundle the vampire had carried out was several inches shorter than it should have been.

"What kind of horrible, sinister plans are they cooking up if they kidnapped Snyder?" Cordelia asked.

"I'm thinking mistaken identity," Oz said. He had made a stack of books and was sitting on it.

"They wanted Mr. Giles," Kendra said a little absently. She was looking at Oz sitting on his stack of books and she just wanted to cuddle him.

"But Snyder isn't even English," Cordy objected as she felt the bump on the side of Giles' head. She was thinking that Giles should just give up and strap on a helmet already.

"Oh, blast," Giles said and not because Cordy was poking his sore head. "I'm afraid we must rescue him."

"We must?" Cordelia looked worriedly at Giles. "He definitely has a concussion."

* * *

Spike wheeled himself through the mansion in search of Angel. He made a list of things he'd rather be doing. Everything was on that list. Seeing that the slayer ditz wasn't going to be any help, Spike had to light a fire under Angelus' big bum himself. The thought put a smile on his face. If only it were a real fire.

There was Angelus looking broody and far too tall. Spike launched right into his sales pitch.

"So dead or alive she doesn't want you. And if you can't get what you want, settle for Hell on Earth. That's one fragile ego you're packing."

Angel turned to look down at Spike and said nothing.

"You are letting a slayer, pardon me, ex slayer, muck up what little brains you got."

Angel only glared.

Spike shrugged and turned as if to leave but instead he turned in a circle.

"So where are the girls? Or do you even know?" Spike asked.

"Out."

"Big boss, things have been getting away from you lately."

"Why don't you take a walk... Oh right."

Spike ignored that.

"Dru and the redhead doing as they please, bringing pet rocks home. Is that how things are done in your house? Those two bent loonies running here and there without so much as Daddy may I?"

"Spikey, go spin your wheels somewhere else."

"It's past time you put your harem in order."

"You think I'm doing it with Willow?" Angel asked pointedly. There was no question that he was doing it with Drusilla.

"She calls you puppy. I pictured you in a dog collar. Her leading you on a leash."

"Stop using your imagination, Spike. But that's all you have now, isn't it?"

"Truth hurts. Ouch. Might want to watch where you are pitching the stones. There's some extra rocks in this house but they sure as hell aren't yours, puppy."

Angel lunged at him and bared his fangs. Bending over Spike, ringing his wrists with his clawed hands, Angel clamped them to the wheelchair armrests.

"There now. That's what I'm talking about," Spike said grinning into Angel's face, way too close to his own.

The smile was genuine. Spike couldn't wait for Angel to squash the redheaded tramp. Left alone, Dru wouldn't cross Angel.

Angel turned away as he heard a door slam.

"So that's where they've been," Spike said seeing a bundle trussed up in garbage bags being carried down the hall.

Angel took in the sight and said nothing.

"That's quiet a ride the girls are taking us on. So you gonna stay in the back seat with us kiddies or is Daddy taking the wheel?"

Angel wasn't listening, or rather, he had already heard. Spike knew the dark look on his face. This look wasn't for show. Angel meant business. Spike let Angel walk ahead of him while he snagged a minion and sent him off with a message.

* * *

As Buffy and Xander were meandering through the peaceful neighborhoods of Sunnydale, Buffy's thoughts were running along the lines of "Apocalypse: What's in it for me?"

"I think Hell on Earth might be fun. Good for some laughs in a death, destruction, and rivers of blood kind of way," Buffy said turning the idea around and around, seeing all the angles. Maybe she just had to give apocalypse a chance. Like it was a movie she could be talked into seeing. As long as there was popcorn, how bad could it be? In this case, blood. Something to munch on, that was a must, a deal breaker.

"Sure. Blood enough to swim in. Bring me a straw." Xander was also willing to go with the flow if blood was flowing.

Buffy didn't look too sure about looking on the bright side of the dark side of things. She frowned. She looked for something to kick. She was torn on the apocalypse issue. A good 45% of her wanted Acathla to go off like a nuke. She felt selfish for the rest of her which wanted designer duds and cute guys to drain of all their blood. The only major advantage offered by Hell on Earth would be strong demons aplenty. That meant more neck breaking, scull bashing, bone snapping opportunities. But designer clothes opportunities would be zero.

"You know what all this talk about the end of the world puts me in the mood for?" Xander asked as they walked through the good old suburbs of Sunnydale.

Xander's hungry look was not roaming her body, so Buffy's second guess was that he was talking about a party. They had stopped not far from a house with all its lights on. Music was blaring. Cars crammed the driveway and the lawn, lined the street, blocked some of the neighbor's cars.

Buffy and Xander turned into the walkway and went into the house, unnoticed. That is until they started ripping open party goers' necks like they were beer cans. Then all eyes were on them. The guests who weren't too drunk started shoving their way to an exit that wasn't blocked by vampires with bleeding corpses at their feet. People who didn't make it through the back door were climbing out of windows, trampling the bushes. But Buffy and Xander managed to corner a half dozen guests against a wall. A few passed out drunks were scattered around, feeling no pain. Buffy surveyed the damage. There was a vomit spot with a kitchen towel thrown over it, several spills, shards of something broken, a dented lampshade.

"Look at this mess. Someone is getting grounded." Buffy picked up a few overturned picture frames until she found a high school graduation photo. She looked around until she found the host.

"You." She pointed at the guilty, high school grad.

"Hey, cheap beer. Shame on you," Xander said as he opened up a can and drank. "And it's warm. I like my blood warm and my beer cold. Ok?"

To demonstrate, Xander picked up a drunk from an armchair, cracked open her neck and drank. She hardly stirred. There were gasps and whimpers at the sight from the more sober party guests.

"You know what, cheap booze tastes better in a cocktail. Like a Bloody Mary or a bloody whatever her name is." Xander indicated the dead drunk. When he let her slip back into the chair, her head dropped forward. Her hair covered the blood dripping down her chest. She looked almost the same as when she was only passed out.

Buffy checked over the party spread - bowls of chips, now mostly broken bits from the bottom of the bag, and gouged out dips still in their original jars.

"No shrimp cocktail, no canapes, no hors d'oeuvres, not even a deviled egg in sight." Buffy tsked. "Now deviled eggs, that's an appropriate vampire party food."

"Um, blood is vampire party food," Xander said as he wiped blood from his chin.

"But a deviled eggs sound so evil," Buffy argued.

"It can be the official appetizer of the apocalypse."

"Shh, don't talk about the impending destruction of everything. You'll scare the children," Buffy scolded. The party guests seemed less concerned about the end of the world and more concerned about being slurped up like a beer and blood cocktail.

Plopping down on the couch, Buffy pulled a drunk into her lap, drank from him and dropped him on the floor. Noticing a stain next to her, she turned accusingly to the cornered guests.

"Did someone spill salsa on the sofa? That's going to stain. And here someone spilled blood on the rug. Oh yeah, that was me. And you," she said, kicking the dead guy whose blood was drooling from his neck.

"Now, remind me who is our host?" Buffy asked as she pretended not to remember. The host nearly fainted when Buffy's searching, yellow eyes settled on him.

* * *

Shoving a slow minion out of his way, Angel stalked over to the stone tomb. With a crowbar, and no reverence, he popped off the lid of the thing. The lid landed on the floor crushing the foot of an unlucky minion guard. Angel ignored his screams. He used his teeth to open up the minion's wrist. Blood dripped into Angel's cupped hand. Chanting, he reached up to the statue and took hold of the sword. When he pulled, nothing happened.

"Not king Arthur then. Glad that's settled," Spike told him as he wheeled himself into the room. He took in the open tomb, lid lying on the floor, blood drying under one corner and ignored the whimpering minion with no foot.

All this noise did not go unnoticed. Dru entered clutching her head, adding her own moans to the footless minion's. Willow came in after her, acting like she owned the place and was looking to evict. The whimpering annoyed her especially. A pile of dust was all that was left of the source of that noise after Willow took a little detour and staked him.

"Hi, pup... I mean... hmmm." Willow stood there lost in thought, pretending she was so ditsy she couldn't remember Angel's name. Meanwhile, Angel considered setting her on fire then putting her out with holy water. Willow shrugged, gave up the mental struggle and turned away like Angel and the murder in his eyes were nothing. Drusilla was still digging into her temples with her sharp fingers. If she kept that up there would be blood. Someone's.

"Look, Dru, it's the boys, playing with our toys," Willow said to Drusilla in a voice one might use when trying to distract a cranky child.

The cranky child was distracted. Dru glided over to Acathla and gazed at his ugly mug ,adoringly. Really, it was the same way she sometimes stared at Angel after he had done something especially nasty.

"He is beautiful isn't he?" Dru said looking at the statue with proprietary pride. No one agreed except Willow. The girls stood before the statue, in worshipful attitude. They might have been two particularly pious nuns, except for the way they caressed their holy statue. Their hands glided over its surface and each other. They squealed with delight, held hands and danced around Acathla. Angel approached armed only with supreme overconfidence and was drawn into their ring around the rosy. He had a hand on each of their waists stopping their dance.

"Keep your head," Spike hissed since Angel looked like he was about to make out with them and not read them the riot act.

Before anyone could be scolded or seduced, Willow pulled a flask from her cleavage and threw holy water in Angel's eyes. Spike stood up in surprise. Willow kicked the crowbar from the floor into her hand and slammed it into Ange's sizzling skull.. Angel stumbled a little and growled ready to tear Willow into tiny, little bits as soon as he could see her. But Willow was hitting him fast, over and over again until he was on the floor, head bloody and burned. He wouldn't have stayed there long if Willow and Drusilla hadn't flipped the sarcophagus lid on top of him and stomped on it. It was the stone lid and not their negligible weight that did the job. Their stomping was purely for pleasure. Spike was kind of enjoying the whole thing until Dru turned to him with a cajoling smile that died as soon as she saw him standing.

Dru stepped off the sarcophagus lid. She took some shaking steps toward Spike and looked down at his legs. Willow was less astonished and more ready to throw the bloody crowbar at him. Spike dodged it but not the wheelchair wielded by Dru. He said, "pet." She screamed, "liar!" She whaled on him.

Willow dove into him just as he kicked away the chair and Dru with it. Willow had him on the floor. Spike flipped Willow before she could straddle him. And he would have been up and kicking some crazy bimbo ass if Dru hadn't gotten hold of the wheelchair again and bashed him senseless with it saying "Liar, liar, liar" with each blow.

* * *

to be continued


	25. Armed To The Teeth

Bad Company

Ch 25: Armed to the Teeth

* * *

The night had only begun and Buffy and Xander were already buzzed and partied out. They might have meandered Sunnydale streets like that until sunrise - aimless, bored, hardly killing much of anyone. Then they sensed a vamp lurking in a dark space between a flower shop and a flower delivery van. Instead of running for his unlife, he came out of hiding and walked right up to Buffy. Buffy grabbed a handful of stake and a handful of suicidal vamp.

This has got to stop, Buffy said as she aimed. What does it say about my reputation that one of these scruffy looking vamp guys would dare to walk up to me willy-nilly like I was the lady at the supermarket giving out free samples of cheese?

Take it easy, Buff, Xander tried to calm her before her inappropriate slaying urge got completely out of control.

I will take it easy when every vamp who crosses my path is either running away or trembling too hard to run. I want to see knees knocking in fear, teeth chattering so hard I can hear them!

Instead what Buffy heard was something indistinct the vamp was trying to say.

"Message," he croaked out with his throat half crushed in her grip.

"Did he say massage?" Buffy asked while holding onto the vampire.

Maybe hes trying to bribe you? Xander guessed.

I cant be bribed with an amateur shoulder rub from... Buffy shook him to show how unsuitable he was as a masseur.

"I wouldn't refuse a shoulder rub. If he was a girl. And it wouldn't have to be shoulders." Xander was thinking about cute vamp girls with their small but strong hands squeezing the tension right out of him. Buffy was about to call him back to reality when she noticed the piece of paper the vamp was holding out to her. Maybe it was a gift certificate. Without letting go of either the vamp or the stake, she took the paper from him.

"Getting crowded. Come get your Watcher, your redhead and anyone else you feel like carting off. Just keep your mitts off Dru," she read.

"Guess you can't kill him," Xander said after she finished reading.

"Can't kill who? This guy? Why not?" Buffy shook the vampire who looked perfectly killable to her.

"Don't kill the messenger," Xander said. "Also because you are not a slayer. But that doesn't hold much water with you, so I'll go with the messenger thing."

Buffy did not look convinced. She squinted. Xander tried to explain.

"Maybe it's seven years of bad luck or you get hairy palms. Also, check your pulse, you are not a slayer." Xander shrugged and sighed, mostly disinterested in the vamps fate and hopeless when it came to curbing Buffys slayer tendencies.

Buffy looked from Xander, the worst witness for the defense ever, to the messenger vamp.

"I need more than a note and some old timey saying to not stake a guy who came up to me just begging to be staked," she told Xander. She then turned to the vamp. "Do you have anything more official? A note from your doctor? Your mom?"

"A bill of lading? A dirty limerick?" were Xander's suggestions. The messenger answered with an unpersuasive look of fear and some frantic struggling, so Buffy staked him. Xander rolled his eyes.

* * *

Having heard something of the vamp's struggle, a uniformed cop veered from his patrol route. An inquisitive Sunnydale cop - such a rare and exotic bird. For obvious reasons, not found much in these parts and as short lived as a mayfly. The cop approached with his hand on his weapon and eyes peeled. There was some extra dust in the air and two people who looked at him the way he looked at a ham sandwich. The cop backed up. His hand gripped the handle of his gun. He didn't take his eyes off Buffy and Xander, and they didn't take their eyes off him.

"Look at him. I've been wanting to eat a Sunnydale cop for a whole second now. So useless, yet so full of blood." Buffy walked slowly while the cop turned, walked away briskly and pretended he wasn't being chased.

"I'm stuffed, but I'll have a sip or two," Xander said being a vamp who never refused a drink or an offer of sex, if only it was being offered.

As Buffy and Xander didn't keep their voices down, the cop dropped all pretense of a dignified retreat and ran for it.

"Those Sunnydale cops sure are skittish. Look at him trying to scamper away from us. Like a cat running from a vacuum cleaner." Buffy was after him.

Xander stopped a moment to admire the sprinting speed of the cop before he joined the chase.

The cop pulled out his gun while running and half turned to shoot. His aim was way off, the bullet hit a tree, and the attempt slowed him down. After a slight speed increase, Buffy grabbed the arm with the gun, extending it away from her. The gun was still in the cop's hand so if he wanted to shoot a random storefront, he was free to do so. Xander stopped at Buffy's heels standing where he wouldn't get shot. The cop held on to the gun, useless as long as Buffy held on to his arm.

"Should we let him shoot us? Just for kicks." Buffy asked.

"No, Buffy," Xander said slowly and clearly.

"You can be like Superman."

"Bullets don't bounce off this." Xander knocked on his chest.

"You wouldn't die, you wimp."

"But it would hurt. Plus it would ruin the clothes."

Now that was a sound reason Buffy could understand.

"You're so right," she had to admit.

Since she dropped the idea of shooting Xander for fun, Buffy squeezed the cop's arm until the gun hit the ground. Xander kicked it away as he took his position in the buffet line. He pushed back the cop's head so both he and Buffy had room to sink in their teeth. As he drank lazily, Xander wondered where Sunnydale got its supply of fresh cops.

* * *

Buffy and Xander walked away from the cop corpse, leaving plenty of blood to go to waste while somewhere a vampire child went hungry. Xander noticed that the route away from the cop corpse led to Sunnydale High School. There were a few places on the way, but Buffy wasn't stopping at any of them. And one of them was a designer shoe store. Xander had been relieved when Buffy went for the cop and not for the rescue mission. But Buffy was like a hyperactive puppy, you could play fetch with her all day, and she was still going to chew up the furniture. Xander made sure not to compare Buffy to a dog out loud.

"Are we really doing this?" Xander asked as they entered the school and headed to the library.

"Sure. We go where the action is."

"I should have let you shoot me. Weren't you the little cheerleader of Armageddon a little while ago?"

"Nah, I was just hungry. Hungry and bored."

That was a dangerous combination. Like vampire and slayer in one hot, little body. Definitely dangerous, Xander thought as he let Buffy walk a little ahead of him and watched her pert ass work her tight pants. Add to that bundle of trouble a couple of living, breathing, regulation slayers, stakes at the ready, and a tornado in the library, and Xander was definitely getting wrong time wrong place vibe. Buffy was ignoring the death stares and weapons pointed their way as they walked into the chaos of the library.

* * *

As the two vampires entered, Kendra held Faith back while remaining in a stance of readiness herself.

"We have priorities. We cannot delay our mission and the rescue a civilian for them," Kendra said to Faith. The "them" was said in a very hurtful way. Buffy pouted.

"Is the sword here yet?" Buffy asked speaking to Kendra, ignoring Faith.

"As a deceased and decommissioned slayer, you do not get the sword, Buffy." Having explained Buffy's ineligibility, Kendra brought out the sword. As she displayed it to good effect, she made sure to hold it away from Buffy. She could see how Buffy's eyes were filled with greed.

"What's with the sword envy, Buff?" Xander wondered. The look in her eyes was scary.

"I just like sharp things."

Kendra and Faith decided not to voice their heartfelt 'hell yeah, you said it, sister' sentiments out loud.

Xander was kicking around loose books and other debris. He was not a sword-crazy girl.

"We never made this kind of mess, did we Buff."

"Hey, you are not kidnapped," Buffy said on seeing Giles taking a seat in a chair Cordy righted for him. "Spike is an idiot."

It looked like Cordy was playing rock paper scissors with Giles, but she was actually asking him how many fingers. Even though he could count fingers just fine, Cordelia wasn't convinced his brain wasn't scrambled.

"Wait, who are you rescuing then?" Xander asked.

"That troll principal," Faith told him.

"Troll? So is he not a civilian then?" Kendra asked.

"Not troll troll. Troll meaning hated authority figure," Oz explained even though he didn't have official confirmation of this. The vampires noticed him for the first time among overturned tables and bookshelves. He, in turn, ignored the vampires. In his current state, they could be across town or in the same room, it made no difference. Another month.

"They stole Snyder. They'll steal anybody. First that Willow flavored fake, now Snyder. Snyder? Snyder?" Buffy was dismayed at Angel's lack of discrimination.

"I'm not clear why you are getting him back?" Xander asked the slayers while looking over at Buffy who was still eyeing the sword.

"We must," Kendra told him.

"I feel completely unmotivated for this mission," Buffy sighed.

Only Xander cared about Buffy's motivation.

"I should hope so. For one, you are a vampire. Two - it's Snyder."

"Should we be delivering Giles to the bad guys?" Cordy was thinking emergency room was the place to deliver Giles.

"If he stays here, they'll just come back and scoop up his helpless ass," Faith explained.

"There is no safe place for him," Kendra said gloomily.

"I am so reassured," the doomed Giles told them. He stood up while Cordelia got ready to shove a chair under him if he started to wobble. He did not wobble. He armed himself and loosened his tie for battle.

Looking just as determined but less tweedy, Oz pulled on the ax Faith had stuck in the door. With some difficulty, it came free.

"Oz," Kendra protested.

"I am coming," Oz said quietly.

Kendra looked down at him with warm admiration. They all headed out, Buffy too.

"What? We're going?" Xander stopped Buffy as she was about to go with the rest.

"I want to be where the action is. I told you."

"OK, action girl, I am staging an intervention. You have a slaying problem, put down the slaying pipe, you need slayer rehab."

"I can stop any time."

"How about now?"

"That sword would look way better on me."

Xander didn't have an argument for that.

"This is the last time I help save the world," he grumbled. "I mean it. I am evil. I am Evil X. Xander made an X with his arms, then followed, the last to leave the trashed library.

* * *

Spike and Angel were tied up and abandoned. It was as if they deserved no more attention than junk mail or warnings on cigarettes. As Spike came to, he righted himself with a lot of grumbling. For anyone needing to breathe, it would have been impossible. The ropes tied his wrists and ankles behind him then went around his neck. When the prisoners sat up, as Angel already had, their heads were pulled back. Lesser vampires would have chosen to just stay on the floor.

"Sneaky bitches!" Spike griped. The gashes in his head were healed but the blood remained making him look freshly lobotomized. Both he and Angel were silently claiming the element of surprise as the deciding factor in the girls' temporary and soon to be corrected victory. But Angel had an additional gripe and not at the girls.

"Did you say sneaky, Spike?" Angel looked at Spike's legs which propped him up in a kneeling position as he struggled to free himself.

Spike didn't even address the charge.

"Why won't these ropes break?" Spike asked as he strained against them with all his strength only to end up tightening them. A mortal would have choked to death doing that.

"Because they aren't ordinary ropes, moron," Angel said. He had already tested the ropes and figured out what they were. If it were possible to kneel with dignity while tied up like a sex slave, he would be doing it.

"Don't tell me they are bloody magic ropes."

"They are woven G'Feder demon hair," Angel said. "Unbreakable."

"I bet that redheaded slag plucked the G'Feder demon herself, right after she plucked your grapes."

Angel wasn't listening. He was adding things up.

"Bloody magic, Spike," Angel said.

"Eh?"

"You might want to shut up long enough to listen to what you are saying."

"I don't think so, mate."

* * *

"I don't want to see blood. I don't want to taste blood. Don't even talk to me about blood," Willow said as she bit into her fifth or sixth victim. Who was counting?

Drusilla had no comment. Her fangs were deep in the thick neck of an ex high school running back. She dropped him and pulled another burly guy into her lap. She bit into him with a grunt of disgust. Blood soaked her clothes and smeared the floor. It didn't come from the victims - live ones piled neatly against one wall, dead ones strewn around like crumpled candy wrappers. A few guys still waited their turn. Not waited so much as slumped unconscious due to carefully administered, non-fatal head injuries.

Minutes ago, as the victims still lay untouched and minions with mops stood at the ready, Willow and Drusilla reached down their own throats and pulled out iridescent eye beetles. The eye on the back of the beetle looked this way and that and the beetles scurried off. They didn't get far before a flood of gore overtook them. Drusilla and Willow were throwing up blood by the buckets. The beetles had been like corks. They now wriggled in blood that minions were trying to mop up.

"The apocalypse will be wonderful," Willow said as she looked down at the pool of blood she was standing in. "Because that's everyone I've ever eaten plus some of my internal organs." More retching followed before she could continue. "Good thing I don't need them. Goodbye organs." And then she vomited some more.

"The price of victory is high. The gods are very angry." Drusilla was kneeling in the blood she had puked.

"I guess when you drink all the blood of a giant Stone Splitter Beast mixed with the fire venom of an Orb Snake from the beating heart of a Titan Ox Demon then you swallow a live beetle to keep it all in, there might be some minor stomach upset," Willow summed up.

Dru heaved up more blood. It was frightening to see so much blood coming out of her, like watching a skeleton throwing up a weeks worth of food. But maybe no more gruesome then what they did to get the blood in - running the rubber tubing from one tenderized but still living, giant demon to another with his chest cut open to expose his heart and an IV bag adding the fire venom into the mix. The enormous heart beat as they bit into it, sucked down more blood than they could reasonably hold and swallowed a beetle each like an after dinner mint. Then they made out. That seemed like ions ago, when they were feeling energized and strong not bent over lurching stomachs.

"I think it was worth it. Did you see Angel's face?" Willow was mostly trying to cheer up herself.

"This torment..."

"Come on. We tortured - how many people between us? This is nothing." Willow gagged every other word.

"My very life flows out."

Willow dismissed Dru's whiny, melodramatic claim. For one thing, what life?

"It's just a little blood throw up. Cats do it all the time. Hacking up a fir ball has to be worse. I mean, it's all furry. Don't you think my sweet? Blech. Is that my spleen? Goodbye spleen."

Once everything was over except for the dry heaving, they looked at the pile of male flesh with hunger and revulsion. These weren't just any bunch of guys, these were weight lifting, steak eating, football throwing kinds of guys. There was enough of them to feed a family of hungry vampires for a week. Willow and Dru crawled over and scarfed them down faster than the minions could serve them up.

* * *

While the slayers, Giles, Oz and Cordy trudged off toward the mansion, Xander grabbed Buffy by the arm. He pulled her back, not to talk her out of it this time. He was getting excited about the mission. It involved messing with Angel, maybe watching him get beheaded.

"I have an idea," he said.

"You?"

Xander tapped his temple.

"There are things knocking around up here."

"Yeah, Faith probably knocked something loose."

Xander sighed and looked blank for a moment.

"Hey, stop thinking sexy thoughts," Buffy said waving her hand in front of his face to dispel any naked and nasty Faith mirages.

"Impossible!"

Xander took a big unnecessary breath then let it out along with his big idea.

"We grab the rock thing for ourselves."

"And then?" Buffy wanted to know.

"Don't know." Xander shrugged. He just liked the idea of stealing something from Angel, even if it was something he had no use for.

Buffy considered for a minute

"I guess it's something to do." It was a good, solid, evil motive. "I like it," she decided. They would figure out what to do with the rock later.

* * *

Xander led the way to the first stage of his plan. They found themselves outside a fence of a construction site.

"You wanted to eat some construction workers?" Buffy guessed.

"If any of them are still hanging around, maybe."

They jumped the fence. There was no one around. Building had just started amid steel beams, concrete blocks, piles of dirt and construction equipment.

"Ooh, there's someone to eat," Buffy pointed as a security guard came their way. The uniform was snug on his generous physique. He breathed hard as he spoke, like the slow walk that brought him there was a marathon.

"That's far enough. You kids, get out of here." He pulled on the belt of his pants to secure it firmly under his overhanging girth.

Buffy and Xander had already turned away from him. Xander waved his arm in the direction of any number of construction related things - giant spools, piles of dirt, construction equipment.

"What do you think, Buff?"

"The future site of Sunnydale's newest discount self-storage? What I've always dreamed of."

Xander was undaunted by the sarcasm. He rushed over to get a closer look at some orange monstrosity.

"Ooh, a backhoe," Xander gushed.

"Figures you'd like something that ends in ho. This is definitely a boy thing," Buffy concluded as she followed Xander reluctantly.

"It's a rock thing! We grab one of these suckers then we grab the rock." Xander mimed a jaw closing with his hands.

"That's not bad," Buffy had to admit. "There is stuff going on up in there." Buffy tapped his head and looked around for an appropriate piece of machinery.

All this time, the security guard had been trying to get their attention.

"You kids high? Move it!" His yelling had the desired effect. Kind of. Buffy finally turned to him. Xander continued to ogle the construction equipment.

"We want one of those," Buffy told the security guard like he was the lady behind the perfume counter.

"We don't rent this stuff," he told her. He still considered them baked.

"That's OK. We kind of stopped paying for stuff."

"A pile driver!" Xander pointed excitedly. Buffy was skeptical.

"How will that help us?"

"A boy can dream." And the boy was dreaming of driving Angel right into the ground with that thing. But he turned his mind back to business.

"A bulldozer," Xander decided as he strode over to one.

"Sounds good," Buffy agreed.

Going up to the machine, Xander saw that it was padlocked to the pile driver.

"Hand over the keys," Buffy demanded of the security guy.

The security guy didn't.

"Let me." Xander vamped out. The issue of heavy machinery was very close to his heart. "Hand over the keys!"

The security guard started to run.

Look at that running away action, just like a real cop, Buffy said.

The fat, running security guard was quiet a sight. There was a lot of motion but not a lot of distance covered. On the uneven terrain, the effort looked superhuman.

"Oh, come on. You'd lose a race to a lame kitten that got itself adorably wrapped up in scotch tape," Buffy said. "Ooh, let's get a kitten."

"I'm not that hungry right now." Instead, Xander walked over to the fleeing security guard who raised his arms in feeble defense.

"Please." the security guard said.

"Fine. Please, give up the keys." Xander even made a pleading face, which was buried under the vampire face.

"All the keys are in the safe. I can't get them," the security guard explained.

He showed them the safe in the trailer that acted as an office. Buffy and Xander could have torn apart the trailer with their bare hands. But the safe could take being dropped from a skyscraper and it wouldn't budge without a combination. It was a small and sturdy safe and no matter how much they kicked it around, no keys fell out.

"Oh, bummer." Buffy was ready to give up and eat the guy.

Xander was not.

"Who can get us those keys?" Xander asked the guard.

"The foreman and ..."

"Get him."

"Call him."

"Yeah."

* * *

After a claim of a bogus and mostly incoherent, unspecified emergency, the foreman came. He looked sleepy and unhappy, bellowing, "What in Hell is going on here?"

Buffy and Xander turned to reveal their vamp faces as an answer. There was no point in even talking to people without vamping out.

We want keys," Xander said.

"We'll give you the same deal we gave that guy. You help us and we won't eat you," Buffy told him. As evidence of their good faith, the security guard slumped in a chair in a corner, unhappy but alive.

The foreman got them keys and freed up the bulldozer from its chains. Xander climbed into the driver's seat.

"Joysticks, yes!" Xander jumped up and down like a kid in the dozer's seat.

"You are like in boy heaven," Buffy observed.

Xander's eyes were aglow. He tried some random controls and Buffy jumped on board before she got run over. The foreman hung on to the other side and pushed a pedal to make the dozer stop.

"Did you mean to go backwards?" Buffy asked Xander.

"Sure. Ok, do some drivers ed for me," Xander told the foreman who looked ready to get out of there.

"That's the brake," the foreman started, pointing to the pedal he had just used.

"I won't need that," Xander said then seeing the looks from both the foreman and Buffy, he added "Just kidding."

"That's the blade."

"The shovel thingy," Buffy clarified.

"Yes. That is called the ripper," the foreman said pointing to the attachment on the back that looked like a giant claw.

"I like it already," Xander told him.

After a few more instructions, Xander was ready and eager to roll.

"Want to sit on my lap?" Xander asked Buffy. That wasn't a totally unreasonable question as there was only one seat. "Come on help me live out my fantasy."

"Shouldn't I be wearing a hardhat and a bikini for that?"

"Just the hard hat. And I mean, just the hardhat."

"I better go on and keep Angel busy or he'll be playing with rocks, opening portals into hell. Or god knows what," Buffy said before she ran off leaving behind only her naked construction girl doppelganger in Xander's mind.

Taking shortcuts, Buffy ran to the mansion ahead of Xander. Some of these shortcuts involved breaking in through a glass storefront and smashing through the back door as alarms blared. Sometimes she jumped fences, sometimes she kicked them down, whatever got her there faster and with the most destruction left in her wake.

Xander was about to follow but then he had another idea. He went another way, taking some shortcuts of his own, rolling over fences and kiddy pools, knocking down birdbaths, flattening lawn furniture and barbecue grills. This was the life.

* * *

to be continued


	26. All Tied Up And Nowhere To Go

Bad Company

Ch 26: All Tied Up And Nowhere To Go

* * *

Giles walked to the rhythm of his head throbbing. The throbbing was a drumbeat in the background while he tried to organize his thoughts. As long as Buffy was in the mix, he could formulate no clear plan. She was a mockery of what she had been. Not just in her impersonation of her former self, not just by wearing the same body. She now mimicked fighting for good, saving the world. He was almost completely convinced that calling on her had been necessary and not an inexcusable lapse in judgment.

"We should not have allied ourselves with evil," Kendra said, as if reading his mind.

"Hey!" Cordelia objected because Kendra happened to look in her direction by pure coincidence.

"Not you. Your narcissism does not rise to the level of evil," Kendra absolved Cordelia, who did not look grateful.

"Hey..." Faith objected.

"Not you, either, though you have many, many faults."

Faith didn't care about her faults. She cared that she wasn't the baddest slayer around. She was just faulty like bad wiring. She wondered who she would have to kill to get upgraded to badass. Buffy herself, probably. She looked at the Watcher wondering how much of a problem he was going to be when it came time to reduce his dead slayer to grit.

Cordelia watched Giles too, but with a different concern. He was like one of those stupid boxers who keep climbing into the ring while their brain matter oozes out of their cauliflower ears. And look at Oz, he was snack-sized and carrying an ax. What did he think he was doing? Cordelia didn't have to trace back their motives very far to see where they converged. They had grief burning holes in their pockets. Had to spend it somewhere even if you can't buy anything with grief, just more grief. If it was money, she could point them to the right stores, but end of the world and pent up grief weren't in her area of expertise. Cordelia stopped.

"Wait a minute!" Cordy's words stopped everyone else too. "Are these the last hours I'm going to spend not in Hell?"

"Quiet possibly," Giles told her. He had been about to suggest to her that she should go home. She had obviously arrived at the same conclusion without his aid. He did so admire that girl. If Buffy had been a little more...

"No offense, guys, but I don't want to spend my possibly last hours on earth with you people doing things I am not even remotely qualified to do." What she was eminently qualified to do was wear gorgeous clothes to perfection and put everyone to shame with her blinding beauty and unparalleled sense of style. She would stick to her strengths.

"Even though I look stunning in black, and I have this amazing black number that would knock you dead, I would rather not go to another funeral," she told the group.

Faith rolled her eyes.

Cordelia looked around at the limited selection and decided to leave Kendra in charge.

"OK, Giles already had his head injury for the day. No more concussions for him," Cordelia told Kendra, who listened with utmost seriousness.

Struck by how much this sounded like a mother giving the babysitter her last instructions, Giles waited for Cordelia to give his bedtime as she continued.

"And he's still grieving for Buffy and Willow, maybe Xander, so don't let him do anything crazy or stupid. Remember he is just a weak, weak British guy with decent teeth and no fashion sense and a head as soft as a new born baby's."

"Really, Cordelia," Giles said as Kendra, instead of coming to his defense, gave him a look of grandmotherly concern.

Faith fidgeted, itching to get moving so she could kill something. Cordelia gave them all one last look like they were already dead. Then she left.

"You know how I want to spend my last hours? I ..." Faith started to say as she watched Cordelia go.

Kendra interrupted her before she could go into any lewd and gruesome details.

"I wish to spend my last hours not listening to the sorts of unsavory things you like to do, Faith," Kendra said in her most prim and uptight way.

In retaliation, Faith hung back and sidled over to Oz. She threw an arm over his shoulder.

"Seriously, when the timer runs out and that one goes off" Here Faith indicated Kendra and did an imitation of a bomb going off. "Watch out, man. It's going to be all handcuffs and leather. You'll be aching for a month if she doesn't put you in traction." Faith finished off the friendly warning by framing Kendra's shapely ass with her hands and smirking.

"Faith!" Kendra gasped. She looked like she wasn't breathing so Faith slapped her on the back to get her started again.

"Come on, you can't actually croak from embarrassment no matter how much you want to. Loosen up."

"I will not!"

"Kablooey!"

* * *

Willow was smiling smugly as she and Dru came into the room where Angel and Spike were kneeling, tied up. Spike straightened as much as he could and tried to catch Dru's eye.

"Magic ropes, love? What? Good old-fashioned chains not good enough? What's happened to you, Dru. You used to be a traditionalist," Spike scolded in a mellow, 'I don't really mind being tied up if it's by you' voice. But Dru only gave him a wan look.

While Dru administered the silent treatment, Willow leaned on Spike, stretching him and his ropes to their limit.

"See what happens when you pretend to be disabled just to get the good parking space," Willow told him.

"A parking ticket?" Spike ventured a guess.

"You know, I hate to see a wheelchair going to waste," Willow said. It was a suggestion for a fitting punishment for Drus benefit, a threat to Spike, and to Angel, it was a prospect for a hearty laugh.

"It's not going to waste, is it, as my pet over there broke the sodding wheelchair over my head," Spike reminded them, before anyone could come up with creative ways of putting him back in it.

"She hated to see it going to waste," Willow spoke on behalf of Dru.

Rather than wait to see if Spike would drive Willow to some welcome violence, Angel got right to the point.

"You girls have been so industrious of late." There was accusation in the fatherly praise that told Willow and Dru that he knew about their recent creative mixology project.

"Girl power, what can I say." Willow tried to deflect with flippancy. Angel wouldn't let her.

"You figured out the Hour of Might potion." There was almost admiration in his voice.

Dru practically melted. Willow gave Drusilla the stink-eye for basking in Angel's attention. It wasn't that Dru was admitting to anything. She was hardly even listening to what was being said. She just enjoyed the way Angel was looking at her, also she was happy not to be puking and there was the prospect of upcoming torture. At the moment, it was mostly the way Angelus was eyeing her. It was a sneering, possessive look. She dreamily wondered what he would do to her if he could. If it wasn't for the promise of an apocalypse, she would loose him and find out.

"Hour of Power, much like Angel's knackers, is a myth," Spike said as he watched Dru appraisingly. But even as he was nay-saying, he knew that Angel was right and not a total weenie.

Though Willow's eyes went large with schoolgirlish innocence, this time no one was fooled. She and Dru acted like two brain-damaged kittens, but Angelus didn't keep Drusilla around because he liked to listen to her blather. And this new "spank me" Willow packaging still contained a working brain, it seemed.

"You hulked out on vampire steroids, love?" Spike tried to guilt Dru.

"You boys grew lazy. You left the fields fallow too long. You left the fruit to rot, and the branches grew heavy..."

Listening to her farmerly complaint, Spike decided that Drusilla had drained one too many ruddy-cheeked farm boys back in the day. She looked at him, sadly, with her arms still reaching up like two bare branches.

"I wanted to drown in a flood of pain and you wouldn't even get up out of the chair, Spikey," Dru said this part with a mournful, acid edge to her voice.

"You dropped the ball. We picked it up," Willow summed up preserving the theme of balls and who had them.

"And speaking of balls. Yours will wither to nothing, you cheater," Spike warned Willow. "Just look at Angel here. Like two raisins that rolled under the fridge. And the Olympic committee will hear about this."

"And where did yours bounce off to?" Angel asked, sick of Spike trying to emasculate him every time he opened his big mouth.

"We've been cooking. Boil and bubble, toil and trouble," Dru said as her hands weaved a pattern through the air. Really, no one could blame the boys for underestimating these two. At any given time of night, Dru's intelligence ranged from lonely wind blowing through a vacant lot to a laser fine and sharp enough to cut diamonds. Right now it was windy on the vacant lot. Willow picked up the slack.

"That's right, Dru. But it was less making a roast for Sunday dinner and more tapping a keg." She decided to skip over 'and then we puked it up like two frat guys after a drinking contest'.

"I'm impressed," Angel lied. "The Hour of Might potion was lost centuries back. Most vampires started to think it never existed."

"Like you did," Willow jumped in.

"I didn't need it." His claim lost a little bit of its credibility coming from a kneeling position as it did.

"Sure about that?" Willow tilted her head and didn't even bother to pointedly look at the ropes tying his wrists to his ankles to his neck.

"For an hour you are unbeatable. Then what?" Angel asked her. He might have been kneeling but he showed no signs of discomfort or defeat.

"You're looking at it," Willow spat out. Though Angel might not have the attitude of a prisoner, he was tied up at her feet all the same.

"I love to tie up Daddy," was Drusilla's airheaded explanation for treason.

Despite being uncomfortably tied up and no one saying a thing about loving to tie him up, Spike ego was significantly less crushed than it had been. He even felt a little pleased with himself knowing that the girls had not beaten them fair and square.

"Guess that means Angel's not limp as a wet noodle. Not a total wanker then. Not a sniveling, snotty, thumb sucking, drooling, diaper soiling ..."

"No, but you are!" Angel snapped like a kindergartener to put an end to Spike's stream of ego destroying invectives.

* * *

While they chatted, the prisoner was carried in. All eyes were on the garbage bag bundle as it was deposited next to Spike by the biggest minion they had. Everyone squinted at the bundle which didn't look quiet right. Willow ripped down the garbage bags to reveal principal Snyder's terrified, unattractive, balding head.

"What have you girls done? This old watcher is looking right peaked. Lost so much of his hair. Must have been some rough handling. Why, his own mother wouldn't recognize him."

Everyone was ignoring Spike's babbling. While Snyder sat there, glassy eyed and trembling, Willow was the center of attention.

"Willow, dear?" Drusilla asked in an unmistakable tone of motherly reproach and disappointment.

Didnt you two learn anything from the man with the frying pan? This is your brain on drugs. Spike shook his head in sad dismay.

Willow hurriedly left the room to the sound of Spike calling her a brainless ninny.

* * *

"Has anyone seen that garbage vamp?" Willow sweetly asked the minions she encountered in the mansion hallways. The garbage vamp was not among them. "I want to congratulate him on a job well done and recommend him for a promotion," Willow promised.

Several minions pointed down the hall where the hefty henchman could be seen running away as fast as his bulk would let him. He had the built and the brain capacity of a garbage obsessed water buffalo. He couldn't really be blamed for the mix up. What little brains he had were taken up by garbage concerns not the ability to tell people apart. Willow didn't care about his limitations. She raced after him.

"Hey there, garbage vamp. Come on. Let's talk trash, let's talk garbage. Tell me how you feel about incinerators?" Willow said cheerily as she caught up to him. Willow landed hard on his back and he went down on one knee for a second. He stood up and Willow spilled off him. If this had been a little while ago, she would have demolished him. Now, she kicked him to no effect. What he lacked in speed he made up for in complete imperviousness. If he hadn't run himself into a dead end, Willow might have just tired herself out trying to get his attention. But he was trapped and doused and set on fire before he could put his size to use. Willow watched him burn then ran back before Dru could free anyone.

* * *

Willow got back looking a little dusty and a lot worse for wear, smelling of lighter fluid and smoke. She was smiling a tight smile of hollow triumph.

"So you finally figured out what you have there is not the high school librarian. That is the high school principal. It can be a little confusing," Angel explained to her, but she wouldn't look at him.

"If we wanted to get out of detention, this would be swell," Spike said.

"What's this, Spikester? You still have some hair left." Willow smiled into his unwillingly upturned face. She mussed his hair before pulling on it. Dragging his head forward against the rope, she tipped him over.

"Leave the hair alone, you pyro." Spike was on his side again and trying to shift his head away from her matchbook.

"What good is he?" Dru asked. She didn't mean Spike. Dru had ignored Spike and Willow's shenanigans. She was staring at Snyder who was silently praying with his eyes screwed shut. Really, he was the most comfortable of the prisoners tied up as he was like a sausage. It wasn't fair, thought Spike as he got semi-vertical again.

"We can still torture him," Willow said since she was a silver lining kind of gal and always up for a little torture.

"Just in case he happens to know about ancient demonic rituals? Maybe heard something around the water cooler?" Spike asked.

"Holy water eye drops, Spike?" Willow offered tugging at an eyelid.

"We can't even use him as a hostage," Angel griped.

"Who's we. Didn't you hear? This establishment is under new management," Willow reminded him shrilly.

But Angel was noticing how displeased Drusilla was with this kidnapping fiasco.

* * *

Willow didn't miss Angels look or Dru's. She pulled Dru away from Angel and into the big room to talk. Acathla stood there as if in reproach. Willow pointed to him.

"That is ours. All ours. Just ours. Not Angel's." The sales pitch cued to the level of a small, easily distracted child didn't sway Dru. She might have been insulted even. But Willow was desperate to remind Dru that her slice of birthday cake was bigger if Angel wasn't invited to the party. Drusilla wasn't listening. She plastered herself to Acathla, snuggling him sadly.

"Our baby sleeps and I so want to play with him. I'll ask Daddy to wake him for me." Dru moved off as if to go back to their prisoners. Willow grabbed her wrist and gave it a hard, join wrenching tug. When Dru turned, Willow tried a soft-eyed, cajoling look.

"I can do it. We know we need blood. I say we cut everything that bleeds until..."

Willow felt her wrist being cut.

"I once adored blood. I think I'd like a taste of yours now." Drusilla's nails sliced back and forth across Willow's wrist as Willow held on to her. Willow didn't even flinch. She raised her arm to offer her shredded wrist to Drusilla. She watched the blood slide across and around her wrist, two streams meeting like a bracelet. As the blood drops hit the floor, Willow decided to do a simple experiment. She pulled her arm away from Drusilla's open mouth and walked up to Acathla. She stared at him as if he might speak to her. As if he might say, "Go ahead." Maybe give her a gold star. As if with an approving nod of his big, ugly head, he might confirm her hypothesis, which with very moment felt more and more like an epiphany.

Willow chanted then cut herself again where she had just started to heal. She reached for the sword handle embedded in Acathla. Before any of her blood hit the sword, Dru sneaked up behind her. Dru's twig thin arms encircled Willow's waist. Swinging her around like they were dancing, Dru pulled her away from Acathla and the sword.

"My blood, my blood," Willow gasped, looking a little wild, like a feverish, excited child. Drusilla knew she had hit on the answer. The air hummed with the rightness of it. She liked her Willow very much just then.

"Listen to you. Shhh," Drusilla said. She licked up Willow's arm where blood had slithered to the elbow. At the source, the wound was already closing. Dru's eyes went from Willow to the statue.

"I have blood too." Dru let go of Willow and stroked the inside of her own arm where the veins stood out black against the bone pale flesh. She stuck a nail in and blood flowed down her arm. "I want a turn."

Willow's eyes sparkled at the prospect of blood, of unleashed power and pain. But she didn't take Dru seriously.

"You just watch," she said nuzzling Dru and holding her back at the same time. But Dru pulled away.

"I want to open the world to darkness! With my blood!" Dru told her.

"My blood!" Willow vamped out. Drusilla vamped out too.

With a merciless, downward shove, Drusilla brought Willow's head onto the floor. She heard her scull crack and sighed with satisfaction.

Willow coiled and kicked her away. But she couldn't stand up yet. Her head was swimming. Drusilla approached her and readied for a kick. Willow caught her foot and stopped faking dizziness. She toppled Dru to the ground and slammed her own body on top of her. The painful contact between the bodies and the floor made both Drusilla and Willow smile. Willow held Dru down. Dru struggled, assuring that Willow's firm grip would turn cruel.

"You drive me mad," Dru said.

"Is that even possible?"

Drusilla laughed with insane delight. Willow shut her up mid laugh with a kiss full of sharp teeth.

* * *

Unexpectedly, neither Faith nor Kendra charged in with stake and sword raised. Puzzled by this, Giles and Oz crowded into the doorway of the large room where Drusilla and Willow moaned and writhed under the statue of Acathla.

"I must say, I was not expecting this," Giles said, averting his eyes.

"What? Vampire babes in flagrante delicto? Happens all the time," Faith informed him. Everyone looked at Faith and her word usage.

"What? I knew this guy once..."

"You must stop right there," Kendra warned her. "All her stories start that way," Kendra complained to Oz.

"I don't doubt it," Oz said, but without judgment.

He was staring at the vampire makeout scene. It was a sad day indeed when a guy couldn't even enjoy the sight of his vamped girlfriend's lesbian makeout session. Giles pulled him away.

"You two go rescue the hated authority figure," Kendra told the guys. Then she and Faith turned their attention to the goth porn scene.

"Oz, I don't suppose you could smell him out? Snyder," Giles whispered. Getting him to focus on something besides Willow was no easy task.

Oz shook his head. Behind them the slayers practiced some vimpirus interruptus.

Giles pulled Oz further away. They moved on, cautiously.

"No offense to the rescue party, but save Snyder is clearly not a high priority mission," Oz observed. Maybe it was a complaint. It was hard to tell.

"We are two perfectly capable individuals."

"Giles, you are good for two things - research and concussions. And I'll need a ladder if we meet the vamp who carried off Snyder."

Giles didn't disagree. He just walked on with purpose. At the same time he kept his mind off that purpose because a mission to save Snyder just made him want to sit down.

* * *

Seeing Kendra hesitate at the door, as if from a sense of decorum, Faith elbowed her.

"Let's jump right in," she urged.

"Faith, we are not here to join a vampire orgy," Kendra whispered with indignation.

"I was thinking," Faith finished the sentence by motioning with the stake in a staking motion. "And you were thinking...?"

"The vary same thing," Kendra said defensively.

"Right. You take the crazy one."

"There are two crazy ones," Kendra pointed out.

"The redhead is mine," Faith said, giving in to an instinctive hatred of Willow.

As the slayers entered, the vampires disengaged from each other.

"None of your evil trickery," Kendra warned Drusilla as they circled each other.

"I have nothing up my sleeve, deary," she said as she showed Kendra her claws.

Buffy arrived to find two vampires and two slayers fighting it out. She resisted the urge to join the fracas, instead she inched along the wall unnoticed. Briefly she hid behind Acathla. Seeing an opening, she kicked the sword right out of Kendra's hand. It spun in the air twice before Buffy snagged it. She swiped the air to clear a path out. Then she ran.

"Who's the favorite now? That's right! The one and only, the original, accept no substitutes!" Buffy shouted as she ran away waving the sword in the air.

With two vampires to deal with, Kendra and Faith couldnt give chase, no matter how much they wanted to.

* * *

"Hey, Angel!" Buffy yelled down the hall while she held the sword high. "I found something sharp to play with!"

She was surprised to find Angel tied up along with Spike. Snyder was there too.

"Fee fi fo fum I smell the blood of ... Hi, principal Snyder! And you two guys." Buffy twirled the sword and smiled at Snyder. Sitting still and small, mostly swaddled in garbage bags, Snyder watched the sword and said nothing.

"Look at you guys." Using the sword to point, she said, "Eeny meeny miny moe, catch a tiger by the toe and he squealed wee wee wee all the way home."

"It doesn't go like that, you bloody ditz," Spike objected probably because he wasn't chosen for immediate freeing.

"You're correcting her now?" Angel hissed at him.

"Oh, right. Deepest apologies. Free us, please," Spike said to Buffy, with very little sincerity.

"Oh this eeny meeny miny moe isn't to see who goes free." Buffy smiled meanly at each of them in turn.

* * *

to be continued


	27. All Rescue No Reward

Bad Company

Ch 27: All Rescue No Reward

* * *

Oz and Giles made their way through the mansion corridors. Ostensibly, they were looking for Snyder, but their main concern was not running into any vampires as even the lowest minion might outmatch them. They listened for footsteps. Oz sniffed the air now and then. Then they heard the somewhat chilling sounds of Buffy in a playful mood. Oz became very grim. Giles grabbed his arm, digging in his fingers until he had his attention.

"As things stand, she can snap you in half then beat me to death with your corpse. I would rather not die such an ignoble and pointless death," Giles whispered in Oz's ear.

Still holding on to Oz's arm as if he were a child liable to run across a highway to catch an errant ball, Giles carefully looked through the doorway to see who Buffy was toying with. At the sight of Buffy holding a sword to Snyder's stomach, Giles cleared his throat and reluctantly released Oz. Buffy turned.

"You need to be stopped," Oz said as he raised his ax.

Giles sighed. Buffy looked uncertain then pointed her sword at Snyder's ropes.

"I was going to free... " Buffy started to say still remembering crazy, ferocious werewolf Oz. Then she looked at the sniveling Snyder and really, no one could sell that lie. "Oh, who cares. It's Snyder."

Oz somehow kept his cool while his hands clenched around the handle of the ax.

"Keep the fangs tucked and I wont bury this in your spine," he told her.

Giles backed up that sentiment with an upraised cross in one hand and a stake in the other.

"Like I would eat that," Buffy scoffed as she lightly poked Snyder with the point of the sword. She switched to a milder tone as she turned to Oz. "You know, Oz..." Oz's stony expression told her not to bother. "Oh, never mind," she huffed. Then Buffy ripped through the garbage bags and ordinary ropes that tied Snyder.

"I am saved?" Snyder croaked, dazed and disbelieving. He wasn't alone. Buffy didn't see any way to justify a rescue of a snotty faced Snyder. Even with Giles and Oz and their sharp objects in the picture, she still couldn't believe she was letting him go..

Snyder was shaking too hard to be able to stand. Giles pulled him to his feet. Seeing Buffy in proximity to Angel's tied hands made Oz want to start chopping heads and making dust fly. It was a nice dream that wouldn't play out in real life. Oz issued an order instead.

"You don't get to free your neck-snapping boyfriend until we are gone," Oz said as Giles propped up Snyder.

"Maybe not even then," Buffy said as she hefted the sword she hadn't used on anyone yet. How pitiful.

"Oh come on, my hands are going numb," Spike complained once the ax left the room and he still had a head on his shoulders.

"I wasn't going to free you anyway," Buffy said. She looked at Angel. He had been conspicuously quiet in a room full of people bearing weapons and grudges.

* * *

"The delinquents have taken over. I am moving to Utah," Snyder said as Giles and Oz led him away. He gave Oz one of his trademarked, dirty, suspicious looks. Giles in turn gave Snyder a similar look and did not inform him of the many varieties of demon found in Utah.

"Wonderful news indeed. Does a thank you come with that? No, never mind, your promise to move away is gratitude enough," Giles grumbled. Risking his life for Snyder, those head traumas have taken their toll. And what explained Buffy? Was she such a creature of whim or was it out of some deference to Oz as a sometimes ferocious beast that she did not cut down Snyder? By virtue of his calling, Giles should really start a dossier on her as he would on any other vampire of note. He had delayed, refusing to address her current condition. Was she not worthy of a dossier? It might even be a long one. If anything, she was now more likely to survive than ever before. To survive and still never see eighteen. Buffy was dead. Yet as things stood now, Buffy might outlive them all. It was a good thing Giles didn't have the time to give the matter of Buffy further though. His head couldn't take any more abuse.

The mansion corridors were dark, shadowy, promising gruesome death at every turn. They followed the same route back.

More than recognition of the place, it was the way Oz held himself and hardly breathed that told Giles that they were approaching the room where they had seen Willow. Oz walked by without turning his head to look for her. Giles slapped a hand over Snyder's mouth and kept him moving.

* * *

"How about we don't wait for any more pissed off school chums to drop in, what do you say?" Spike tried to get things going in his most encouraging voice, offering himself as the first to be cut loose.

Instead of freeing anyone, Buffy was pacing in front of the two tied up vampires, her focus on Angel.

"Check you out - tied up and not destroying the world. I think I'm kind of ashamed of you right now," Buffy said to Angel.

"I tried to tell him." Spike was kissing up but she wasn't paying attention.

"I came all this way to do battle, duel to the death, stop you from unleashing the apocalypse or whatever - mainly I came for the mayhem. And I find you sitting around trussed up like a turkey with Spike as the side dish."

"Oy! I am no side dish. I am the main course, plenty for everyone. And we wouldn't be trussed up if you would..."

"How did they do it?" Buffy asked having already beaten the story of their humiliating defeat from some minions. "Was it their staggering intellect? Their tightly packed muscles?"

Spike jumped to defend their reputation seeing as Angel sat there exactly like a trussed up slab of meat.

"Tricks and magic, unsportsmanlike behavior of the lowest kind, conduct unbecoming and also there was a potion for temporary super-strength."

Angel gave Spike a look of contempt for explaining himself and doing it so ineptly. Not that Buffy was listening.

"You could distract those two by jingling a set of keys. It's like you were outsmarted and overpowered by two cats."

"Buffy!" Angel sounded dangerous. Tied up, he didn't look very dangerous.

"You want to tell me what exactly you saw in Drusilla? A wire hanger has more sex appeal! It's like doing it with a broken umbrella!"

"Is that what's sticking in your craw?" Spike snickered. He considered defending Dru's charms but she hadn't exactly racked up a lot of points with him lately.

"And a chicken could beat either of them at tic tac toe." Buffy continued to rant. "And Giles getting chummy with those two slayers, shiny, new and right out of the box..."

Once more Spike bemoaned Angel turning Buffy. At least when she was a slayer, she knew which way her stake was pointing.

"Could you maybe keep your rant a bit more focused?" Spike asked.

Angel stood up, his ropes loose, his hands and feet free. He waited for Buffy to notice. Buffy was still going on and on, until she realized that Angel towered over her.

"There is nothing like a little motivation," Angel told her. "Usually a threat of impending death is a good motivator. But you, Buffy, really know how to inspire a man. I couldn't listen to you bitching for another second."

Ignoring the sword, Angel threw Buffy right through a wall.

"I thought you said they couldn't be broken," Spike asked as he tried to break his own ropes without success.

"They can be untied," Angel said as he went over to pick up Buffy's sword.

"Oh. Right. So could you untie mine?"

"What do you think?" Angel asked while looking at the sword as if it were a mirror.

"Yes and gladly?" Spike said without much hope. No matter how much he wanted to be untied, the best Spike could get was Angel not testing out that sword on him before he left.

* * *

Willow turned her head toward the door as something familiar passed. Faith slugged her.

"Cancel your appointments for today, sweetie. You are booked," Faith told her while ducking a return swing.

Kendra had a good grip on Drusilla's wrists to keep her from clawing at her face like a crazed cat. She then tripped Drusilla and pinned her to the ground with her knee. Releasing one wrist, she pulled her stake out as fast as she could. Drusilla gouged her arm and sent the stake flying. At the sight of spilled blood, Drusilla licked her lips. Kendra jumped off of her before Drusilla could lick her up like a dripping ice cream cone.

"I bet you taste delicious," Drusilla cooed.

"I do not," Kendra said as she held her arm and looked around for either her stake or ...

"Where is the sword, Faith?"

"I thought you had it!" Faith yelled.

"I thought you had it!" Kendra yelled right back.

"Ladies," Angel announced his presence. He had the sword they were looking for and swung it at Willow and Faith's heads. And if the sword had actually connected with anything but a few strands of hair, it would have been a cool two for one deal. As it was, all four of them rushed him as the sword was finishing that useless swing. Two vampires and two slayers piled on top of Angel, mostly getting in each other's way, their only accomplishment to knock the sword from Angel's hand. Once he no longer had the sword, the slayers lost interest in Angel and dived to grab it. Willow scooted away, leaving behind a handful of red hair in Angel's grip. The catch in his other hand was content to stay there. Holding Drusilla by the neck, Angel wasn't surprised to see her smiling.

* * *

Buffy picked herself up with an ouch and dusted off her clothes. She cursed out Angel and a rip in her shirt. She looked around for her sword but didn't find it.

"Angel took it. Now untie me you ... procrastinator," Spike told her reminding her that he existed. Seeing as he was tied up and helpless, he was holding back on the insults. Instead of rewarding his self-restraint, Buffy ignored him.

"You want me to take Dru off your hands," Spike offered since she wasn't rushing over to free him.

Buffy decided that Spike was good for something after all and untied him. Dealing with Drusilla would be like squashing a spider - not difficult but definitely gross in a goose flesh raising kind of way. If Spike wanted to handle the spider, he could have her.

Buffy walked to the big room with Spike running past her. No dignity. When Buffy got there, she found Angel throwing Drusilla at Willow, Willow dodging and heading for Acathla. Kendra was there just in time to stop her with the sword. Faith was complicating things by trying to stake everybody. Buffy stared and stood back.

Spike shoved Faith into Kendra and grabbed Dru. He tried to drag her away but she wasn't going. Angel tried to rip Willow's face off. When she skittered away he picked up the sword Kendra had dropped. Kendra, grabbing for the sword, got there just in time to avoid getting disemboweled as Angel tried to slice her open. Faith tried to stake Dru even if it meant going through Spike to do it.

"Look at the healthy competition to destroy the world. It's like the destroy the world Olympics." But the lack of decorum and clearly defined teams, made it only a few chairs and broken bottles short of a bar brawl.

Buffy was dying to jump into things but wasn't sure who she should attack. She briefly considered doing ini mini mini mo again. Spike was busy wrangling Dru. Faith was trying to stake Willow. Kendra was trying to get the sword from Angel and also trying not to get sliced in half by Angel.

The sword. That decided it. Buffy lunged between Kendra and Angel. After a snap that might have been a few of Angel's fingers, Buffy had her sword. Anyone trying to get it back from her, was going to have to take the pointy end first.

* * *

"You are not the slayer any more, Buffy," Kendra reminded her as the sword was jabbed in her direction.

Angel growled his agreement. He was noticing that Buffy had become annoying since being turned. Maybe that wasn't the best idea he ever had.

"You've been fired, Buffy. Meet your replacement. And your new job description doesn't involve killing other vampires," Angel explained. Of course he wasn't above killing other vampires especially annoying ex girlfriends trying to stick him with swords.

"Xander keeps telling me that. 'Stop killing vampires bla bla bla.' But I've noticed something - killing humans is easy. It has all the challenge of opening a bag of potato chips. Sure, potato chips are yummy, but cracking open a bag isn't exactly a fight to the death. So here I am."

Angel pulled back his hand before he lost it. Mostly he looked for a way to use Kendra's moves to his advantage. Kendra made only tentative attempts to regain the sword, afraid that she would give Angel an opening to grab it instead.

"I'll be glad to put some excitement back in your life," Angel said as he slid under the sword into Buffy's legs. While she dodged and tried to spear him into the floor, Kendra held back, happy to let her stick it to him.

"Are you trying to date me again?" Buffy asked and missed.

"No, I'm trying to kill you again." Angel was up on his knee with his fist in Buffy's middle. She staggered but held on to the sword. Angel flipped Kendra as she sneakily tried to stake him in the back.

"Kill me once, shame on you, kill me twice, forget it!" Buffy yelled as she sliced up the air around Angel's neck.

"That's not how it goes," Spike told her in passing. He was chasing Dru who had gotten away from him and wanted to wrestle with Angel. Nothing new there. Spike grabbed Dru, but it wasn't easy trying to both protect and attack her. He had to let her go and duck to avoid a stake to the heart from Faith.

"Hey! I am not the one trying to suck the world into Hell," Spike said to her and followed it with a punch to the face.

"Did you stop being a vampire? No? Then you're fair game," Faith aimed a few kicks at him. Most missed, one connected. She should have been paying more attention to Willow, who was cutting open her wrist and getting ready to make a wish on Acathla. Angel noticed and tackled her.

Drusilla jumped on Buffy's back, her nails like grappling hooks. Kendra tried to stake Drusilla, and if she accidentally got Buffy in the bargain, oh well. But Buffy was trying to dislodge the bag of bones off her and wouldn't hold still. Her sword arm was immobilized, and Drusilla's fingernails were really digging into her. Buffy finally just slammed her into a wall and would have pinned her there like a bug if Spike didn't shoulder her out of the way.

Faith had switched to trying to stake Angel and/or Willow. Kendra was helping her. Buffy still held the sword but wasn't sure who to kill with it until Faith almost staked her as she was kicked across the room by Angel. The near staking was no accident.

"Way to prioritize!" Buffy complained as she tried to chop her arm off.

Faith evaded and shrugged. She tried to take the sword but only in passing as she took a run at Willow before she could smear Acathla with blood. But Angel was there first to snap Willow's bloody wrist. Willow screamed half in anger, half in agony as Angel tossed her into the slayers. Drusilla swooned entirely with pleasure. Angel stared down Acathla and envisioned the Hell he promised to bring.

* * *

To be continued


	28. Saved For Later

Bad Company

Ch. 28: Saved For Later

* * *

Angel heard the whoosh of sword through the air and turned to a blur of steel and Buffy. Grabbing the blade with his hand, Angel let the sword cut him before he released it and turned away. Buffy looked down at the blood on the sword. She raised her eyes to glare at Angel turning his back on her so rudely. He was reaching out to Acathla until Buffy lunged at him. Angel sidestepped the attack and the sword was embedded in the statue. Before Buffy could pull the sword out, Angel shoved her out of his way. He pulled the sword free and, in the same motion, swung it at Buffy as she tried to snatch it. Buffy dodged the sword she was supposed to be wielding. She deftly avoided getting any unsightly slashes on her person as Angel advanced. This was no swordplay, Angel was swinging Buffy's sword like an executioner. Buffy jumped back feeling the tickle of air being cut very close to her skin.

"Hey! You are trying to kill me! I can't believe you are trying to kill me twice and I still haven't forgiven you for the first time!" Buffy's indignant pose was lost amid some twisting and bending as Angel tried to whittle her down to nothing but dust.

"I made you immortal. But don't worry, I'll fix that," Angel promised and tried to deliver on his promise.

"You gave me a hickey from Hell," Buffy told him. Her dodging kept her only a fraction of an inch from the blade.

"Hell? Wasn't there something?" Angel pretended to remember, "Oh that's right." He turned away from her and back to the rock. He drew the edge of Buffy's sword over the palm of his hand.

Buffy planted a kick in the middle of his back that sent him into Acathla.

"There, go make out with your boyfriend!"

But Buffy's jealousy must have gotten the better of her. Before Angel and Acathla could make out, she knocked Angel away from Acathla with a side-kick. Angel growled. It looked like he wouldn't be able to reclaim his manhood by way of an apocalypse until he finished with Buffy. Whenever Angel tried to ignore her in favor of the stupid ugly statue, she was on him. As she kicked him again, Angel got tired of Buffy trying to be the center of attention. Focused on his sword, Buffy didn't expect Angel to grab her by the neck. He picked her up and slammed her into a post. Buffy grabbed his sword arm. Angel decided he didn't need the sword to slam her head into the column until it cracked like an egg. Buffy didn't agree with this plan. She bit him, taking a chunk out of his neck.

"See how you like it!" Buffy said as she got herself out of his reach, mouth and teeth bloody.

Angel held a hand to his neck looked down at the blood, said "thanks" and moved toward Acathla. His blood was inches away from the statue. Out of the corner of her eye, Buffy saw Willow take a leap. She jumped on Angel and knocked him to the ground. The sword skidded over the floor toward Buffy. Buffy was ready to reclaim it when the mansion wall collapsed.

The beneficiaries of the structural damage were two slayers and Dru and Spike, their rivals in a messy scuffle. All four were neatly buried and a cloud of dust rose in their place. Yellow and magnificent, Xander's bulldozer came through the dust cloud. Buffy clapped.

"Hello! Anybody home!" Xander yelled from the driver's seat as he rolled over the rubble and possibly some vampires and slayers trapped under it. There was a crunch of masonry chunks under the dozer's weight and, Xander hoped, bones.

Angel looked up from the floor ready to tear Xander into tiny pieces or at least put him on the list of people he was going to tear into pieces after he got Willow off him and opened a portal to Hell.

"Where's the rock?" Xander asked.

Buffy helpfully pointed to the statue.

"We should have gotten the backhoe," Xander said as he considered how to use the dozer on the statue of Acathla.

"Xander!" Buffy warned him as Angel threw Willow off him. Willow rolled to the floor and rushed at the statue. Xander winced seeing Willow rip her hand open on her own teeth.

"Hey, Willow. Whatcha doing?"

"Making this world more to my liking."

Willow's run at the statue ended with her hand raised as Buffy tackled her to the floor. Then she had to turn right around and stop Angel from getting the sword back. Buffy pulled the sword from the rubble as Xander plowed into the statue. The best way to stop the kids fighting over a toy - take away the toy. The statue slid until it hit the wall then fell into the shovel part of the dozer.

"Say bye bye to the ugly guy!" Buffy said as she ran for the dozer.

"Bye Angel!" Xander shouted. "Hop on, Buff."

Using the sword, Buffy held off Willow and Angel. She ducked as Xander turned the dozer around to show them its claw like arm. He raised the claw and lowered it threateningly.

"It's called a ripper. Guess what it does?" Xander yelled, grinning. Angel and Willow retreated only a grudging half a step at a time as Xander forced them back to let Buffy climb on. He then knocked down another wall sending the debris on Angel's head and coincidentally Willow's. With those two busy trying to get the wall off them, Xander and Buffy drove away.

The statue was standing tall, its twisted face looking ahead like an ugly masthead of the dozer. But a shuddering of the mansion's floor bounced the statue out of the dozer's grip.

"You lost the ugly guy," Buffy pointed out.

"No time for Angel. We got to go," Xander said misunderstanding Buffy again on purpose.

"What's the rush and what's this shaking?" Buffy asked as she had to hold tight to stay on board the dozer.

"I picked up some extra stuff on the way," Xander said as he drove away from the mansion like they were being chased.

What followed them was the ear-shattering boom of an explosion and the roar of collapsing walls and a crash as the roof came down. A dust cloud rose high into the night sky. Xander turned the dozer to give them a view of the destruction mostly obscured by the dust.

"You snagged some explosives," Buffy guessed as the mansion lay demolished. Xander just admired his work and waved off the dust as it spread over them.

"You really don't like Angel," Buffy concluded since he sure as Hell didn't do all this to save the world.

"You could say I came down on him like a ton of bricks."

"Yeah, 'you' could say that."

"Yup."

"The statue is still standing." And there it was standing where it had fallen amidst the rubble.

"Hmm. Must be indestructible," Xander said with very little concern.

"Xander, it's not even tipped over."

"Maybe with more explosives or some kind of nuclear weapon?" Xander mused. The military remnant of him getting enthusiastic about the idea. "Before you make your pick, I can get my hands on more explosives easy, nuclear weapons, eh, 50/50."

Buffy looked at him and Xander chose to believe that she was impressed. Maybe even turned on.

"Let's go look at the damage," she decided.

"Morbid. I like it."

They drove back and jumped down to get a closer look.

"I was hoping for more corpses. Some legs and arms," Xander complained as she kicked at a loose stone. He hoped the dust they were waving away wasn't just dust.

"There's an arm. It's Angel's," Buffy said, recognizing it.

Xander pulled on it.

"It's still attached. Too bad."

Buffy looked at him and marveled at the power of wishful thinking. Angel lay under the smashed masonry, dust plastered to blood that ran down in rivulets from his numerous, but to a vampire, superficial wounds.

"Hey, little piggy, I huffed and I puffed and I blew your house down!" Xander shouted at Angel.

Angel's eyes snapped open and furious.

"He looks mad."

Angel was half way in, his legs dangling in the basement with many pointy pieces of wood supports underneath, waiting to impale him. Xander nodded his approval at this fortuitous arrangement of vampire and sharp wood.

"A little help here, Buffy," Angel told her gruffly. He was in to his armpits, and by his expression, squeezed pretty tight by nasty, jagged debris.

"Should we help? Pull him out?" Buffy wondered as she watched Angel's unsuccessful struggle to free himself.

"I'll help you push him in." Xander offered.

"Pull him out or...?"

"Push him in," Xander voted.

"How about neither," Angel announced and their indecision was resolved as Angel got himself up and out of the hole, kicking slabs of concrete out of his way. He was all ripped to pieces, but not where it counted.

"You used to be better at this rescuing stuff, Buffy," Angel said as he dusted himself off and pulled a handful of nails from his gut. "Thanks for nothing. Again."

"I think I'm losing my taste for rescuing, saving, protecting, breathing."

"About time," Xander grumbled.

"Now you know what it's like to have a big fat building fall on you," Spike said to Angel or no one in particular. Spike was stoically ignoring a ruler sized piece of wood sticking right through his shoulder. Drusilla got a big dose of building on her and Spike was frantically trying to dig her out.

Acathla stood there unharmed and neglected. But Willow wasn't as inattentive as the others. Shaking off some rubble, she stalked toward the statue. She didn't even need to cut herself, she was already bleeding profusely. Seeing her unwavering determination, Angel took some big steps to overtake her.

"You two still want to destroy the world? Does someone need to drop a house on you? Oh that's right, already did that." Xander threw up his hands in surrender.

"Our Willow was always an overachiever," Xander added fondly a he watched Willow get yanked back by her hair.

While Buffy and Xander looked bored with the Angel and Willow's competitive spirit. The slayers tiptoed over jagged debris and each slayer took down a vamp with a tackle. There was wrestling, kicking, and even hair pulling, mostly Angel. Vamp wounds closed and had to be reopened in numerous attempts to activate the statue.

Buffy picked up lose rubble and threw it at the fighters pretty much indiscriminately. Xander knew a fun, new, time wasting and injury causing activity when he saw one and joined her.

"Would you two stop that!" Angel yelled.

"Yeah, watch it!" Spike added as he continued to dig for Dru.

The slayers glared, fought, and ducked when appropriate.

"It's like dodge ball. I miss school," Buffy said.

"Shut up!"

"I miss the wanton cruelty."

"The cruelty of children is unmatched even by demons," Xander agreed as he threw concrete, aiming for Angel almost exclusively.

As the slayers and vampires fought each other to a standstill in the rubble, Buffy yawned. She looked down at her ruined shoes.

"New shoes?" Xander guessed when he saw Buffy heading off, probably to a shoe store.

"What about the end of the world?" Xander asked as he joined her.

"That's more of a slayer problem," Buffy said as she headed for the dozer.

"Way to go, Buff! Way to kick that nasty slaying habit. You might want to let them have the sword," Xander said seeing that she still carried it and swung it around like it was an umbrella and not an instrument of death.

"But I... oh OK." Buffy wind-milled her arm and threw the sword high into the air. It followed a steep arc, nose-diving into the middle of the fight.

"Timber!" Buffy yelled a second after the sword landed a hair's breadth from impaling Faith.

"Bitch!" Faith grabbed for the sword and so did Kendra. The blade, embedded half into the ground, wouldn't give. They pulled in unison and freed it. There was a minute or two of slayer vs. slayer struggle until Kendra yelled "I have seniority" and wrenched the sword away from Faith.

The vampires did not wait patiently but their infighting kept them from reaching the statue before Xander's dozer picked it up again.

"We're taking it?" Buffy asked.

"I figure that will pretty much upset everyone."

"Just as long as no one feels left out."

With Buffy swinging on its side, the dozer went off with Xander in the driver's seat. The vampires and slayers did a first rate job of getting in each other's way and letting Buffy, Xander, and the statue get away.

* * *

to be continued


End file.
